Marquis (8-6, 4.11)
Vargas (3-4, 7.78)
This is the point last season where our 16-wheel propane tanker, already ablaze, slammed into a concrete overpass at 70 mph, while pursued by a battalion of Uruk-Hai, deeply upset at remarks made regarding their sisters. I was initially merely going to write, "the wheels fell off", but that doesn't do what happened justice - and besides, the wheels had already fallen off when Sexson went down.
No: in our 86th game last year, on July 8th, we beat San Francisco. However, we lost the next game, and the rest of that series. After the All-Star Break, we came home and were swept by the Dodgers. The Giants, ditto. Houston: same result. And the Rockies punked us 19-6 in a three-game series. After eighteen days without a win, Brandon Webb finally outpitched Andy Pettitte in Houston, and the grimmest period in Diamondbacks history, finally ended.
Let's hope for better tonight, shall we? And, oh, maybe more than three runs, although rather too many players have been slumping lately. For the past week, five regulars (Tracy, Counsell, Clayton, Snyder and Gonzalez) are below .210, "led" - if that's the right word - by Gonzo's 3-for-27 performance. Small sample size, sure, but no-one's stepping up to balance this, save perhaps Shawn Green (.360, 5 RBI), and the team as a whole is batting only .223 in the past seven days.
Vargas has been the beneficiary of some very pretty run support in his past three starts but, given the above, it's plausible that will not continue tonight. Though it's still possible: Marquis has been winless in his past four starts, allowing 17 earned runs in barely twenty innings. If last night had the feel of a low-scoring game from the first innings, this one could be an offensive assault.
Any participation by me will be slightly delayed; got to go to the Post Office, then have dinner. Whether I bother to pass subsequent comment will likely depend on the score at that stage!