Diamondbacks 1, Brewers 4 - One-hit Wusses

Never a good sign when your team has more errors than hits, but the day after St. Paddy's seemed to find Arizona with a monstrous hangover, as our hitters proved completely unable to solve Milwaukee starter Yovani Gallardo. He pitched five innings of no-hit ball for the Brewers, with the D-backs hitters managing only three walks. Gallardo faced just one batter over the minimum, thanks to Chris Snyder getting caught stealing second and Chad Tracy hitting into a double-play. Things didn't get any better after he was relieved, with Augie Ojeda [newly returned from the WBC] providing Arizona's sole hit of the afternoon, singling home Chris Roberson from second in the sixth inning. That was the last base-runner the team would manage. Needless to say, not much to report from the box-score - Chris Snyder had two of the team's three walks.

Doug Davis had his first spring outing in more than two weeks, having been held out for a while, because of issues with his triceps. It seemed to go very well, with Davis also stopping the opposition from getting a hit, albeit over only 2.1 innings - he walked one and struck out two. Said Doug afterwards, "I felt really good out there, sometimes too good, overthrowing a little bit," but laid off his full repertoire of pitches since he "wasn’t real confident in snapping off the curveball as of right now." He should get three more starts before the regular season and, assuming there are no more issues, shouldn't have any problems being ready for that.

Mostly a grab-bag of relievers the rest of the way, with the only real name among than Chad Qualls, who ended up taking the loss for the run he allowed in the fourth, on two hits. Leo Rosales gave up another one in a couple of innings, and was followed by Seth Etherton, who allowed two Brewers to cross home-plate in the seventh, before adding a scoreless eighth. Esmerling Vasquez pitched a scoreless ninth, but got to wince on see a final hit tally which read Milwaukee 11, Arizona 1, especially with a starting line-up that was about half-full of everyday starters for the Diamondbacks.

Someone we won't be seeing any more is Jailen Peguero, who has been handed his release by the Diamondbacks, which has to count as a moderate shock. He was something of a fringe contender for the bullpen, and hadn't exactly had a stellar spring, surrendering 11 hits and seven earned runs in five innings of work. Still, he appeared in 25 games between this season and next, so it was a surprise he was entirely cut, rather than sent to Tucson. Seth Etherton, Jon Coutlangus and Esmerling Vasquez were all also culled and re-assigned, though in less dramatic fashion. This leaves the D-backs with a total of 41 players in camp: 17 pitchers; 5 catchers; 9 infielders and 10 outfielders..

Some lengthier audio clips from our colleagues at KTAR: interviews with Bob Melvin, and Kirk Gibson from yesterday, and Snyder today. Melvin talks about how Eric Byrnes is going to be handled, Max Scherzer's rehabilitation, and how impressed everyone has been by Evan Frey. Kirk Gibson's interview is a little less directly Diamondbacks-oriented, discussing music and 'grinding' out games, but Snyder discusses the team's attitude, his contract extension, why pitchers like throwing to certain catchers and whether he is 'feeling sexy in Tucson.' Blame Conor Jackson for the last... Anyway, here are the clips. Enjoy.

Audio courtesy of KTAR 620

Off-day for the Diamondbacks tomorrow, so I'll be posting the long-awaited last in the 'Know Your Enemy' series, covering the Dodgers. This will be done from a specially-hardened bunker in a secret location. Speaking of LA, here's an interesting "and finally..." story: Mandy playing cricket?