Record: 4-2. Pace: 108-54. Change on last season: 0

So, did I miss anything? The filming dragged on rather longer than expected: I just got home, in fact, some eight hours after leaving the house. Roger Corman could have shot two entire features in that time. :-) However, as the first location was a bar, with the Diamondbacks game playing on one television, I was not complaining too loudly, even though that's the first time I've gone into a bar and not had a beer in... Oh, either far too long, or not long enough.

We wrapped shooting there at the end of the eighth inning, and at that point, Arizona were trailing 1-0, and not exactly setting the world on fire, having managed just three hits, all singles, at that point. Oh, well, I thought, as we headed over to the martial-arts school that was doubling as the therapist's office [hey, you take locations where you can get them!]: two out of three ain't bad. Mrs. SnakePit swung by there for a bit, and I asked her to check on the score when she got back to The Sets. When I got the text message, "AZ 5-2 :-)", I must confess to shaking the phone and wondering if Chris has mis-sent me a corrupted version of yesterday's score or something.

Yeah, looks like I did miss some stuff:

Master of his domain: Mark Reynolds, +64.5%
Honorary mention: Stephen Drew, +33.2%
God-Emperor of suck: Brandon Lyon, -29.1%

Usually, I keep the Fangraph for the end of the post, but in this case I think I'll make an exception, as it's just too delicious to avoid feasting my eyes upon any longer. Large-size copies of the above, suitable for framing, will shortly be available through the SnakePit shop. ;-) Despite soco's "interesting" usage of Photoshop, Darin Sutton and Def Leppard, I think we have to lay this one at the door of St. Penelope. Let the permanent record show, that Foulpole invoked her spirit in the Gameday Thread comments after we had gone down quietly in the eighth. Specifically:

Penelope says "c'mon guys. We only have 3 outs left and we haven't scored squat."

http://www.bunnysattic.com/tutorials/BrushedWallpaper/PenelopeCruz003.jpg

Ask and ye shall receive. Single by Jackson, two-run bomb by Reynolds [much as we endured in a Cincinatti ninth, after failing to bunt]. Thank you very much. Given the extremely specific nature of the request above, she gets a pass with regard to the second consecutive blown save in the bottom half of the ninth, as Lyon allowed a one-out homer to Holliday. However, the Rockies fans can also be blamed for subsequent events, taunting the baseball gods by doing The Wave in a 1-0 game. That was just begging for trouble: no good ever comes of waving your arms in the air and going "Woooo!" Just ask any of the drunk girls in the Scottsdale clubs at 2 am.  Allegedly.

The drama was not over. Drew, inserted as part of a ninth double-switch led off the tenth with a homer, Mark Reynolds and Alex Romero adding insurance RBIs later in the frame. It was the latter's first official at-bat, after his sacrifice bunt and fly, and though he leaves one exclusive club, he's now in another one: those players with multiple RBI, but only one career at-bat. That one still also has only five members, with Romero the only pitcher. Again, I don't expect his membership there to last very long. The drama still wasn't over, however, as Qualls came in for the save and promptly walked the first two Rockies, to bring the tying run to the plate. Fortunately, Spilborghs grounded into a nice double-play - our fourth of the game - and Troyboy was retired for the final out.

Lost to a great extent in the furious final couple of innings, was a great outing by Edgar Gonzalez. He restricted Colorado to one run in five innings, scattering six hits and no walks, while fanning four; that's the kind of line that I'd take every time from our fifth starter. It did take EdGon 88 pitches to get through those five innings, but the only ran came on a pair of two-out singles, separated by a stolen base. Good work followed behind him by Brandon Medders - two innings, one single - and Juan Cruz, who walked one hitter in the eighth.

And so, the Rockies just fail to achieve only their second 1-0 win at Coors in franchise history [the other being on July 9, 2005, over the Padres]. instead, Arizona sweeps them with two emphatic victories and a late comeback, and finishes the road-trip at a more than acceptable 4-2. That ties us with the Dodgers atop the NL West...and guess who's coming to Chase tomorrow? Yep, it's now time to beat LA. Should be a good series, as we continue on into an apparently unending stretch of games against our divisional rivals.

Thanks to the following: soco, DbacksSkins, Azreous, kishi, unnamedDBacksfan, foulpole, snakecharmer, Russ, azshadowwalker, hotclaws, seton hall snake pit, AZDarkKnight, dstorm, 4 Corners Fan, LucaMaz3, singaporedbacksfan, peachy rex, Captain D Bag, Wimb, Mr. Philosophical, bcloirao, Silverblood, dbacksbj and Muu, for their Gameday Thread contributions. ["Unmarking 558 comments" goes the screen, as I hit Shift-A. I can almost here it sighing...] The discussion in the thread on blackout restrictions led me to post a Fanshot, as it seems that MLB are moving to revise the current territorial coverage. I'm also intrigued by the mention of the Baseball Channel on cable next year: sounds like a must-have.

Meanwhile, Jake Peavy got caught with his hand in the cookie-jar - and going by the photographic evidence, looks like he was after a chocolate one. Surely the reigning Cy Young winner wasn't...cheating, was he? "He had dirty hands", according to manager Bud Black, and Peavy also vehemently denies any malicious intent. Newsflash, Bud and Jake. It doesn't matter. Let me read to you from the Official Rules, section 8.02(b):

The pitcher shall not...Have on his person, or in his possession, any foreign substance. For infraction of this section (b) the penalty shall be immediate ejection from the game. In addition, the pitcher shall be suspended automatically. In National Association Leagues, the automatic suspension shall be for 10 games.

Emphasis added. "Any foreign substance,'" and there can be little doubt about this being a foreign substance, unless - as noted in a number of places, with obvious unsubtlety - they'd run of toilet-paper in the clubhouse. Odds of Peavy actually serving any suspension for his rules breach, however? Slim to none, and Slim just left town...