Going to keep this one brief, since... Well, let's just say it's rarely a sign of a good game when you have as many errors as runs scored. That was the way this afternoon in Arizona's first "away" contest since SRF@TS opened, taking place not far from Salt River Fields at Talking Stick. Actually, it was still taking place in Salt River Fields at Talking Stick, since the home team today were our stadium-mates from Colorado. I vaguely wonder what it'd be like if we continued this over into the regular season, sharing a park somewhere up near Four Corners...
Good things for the Diamondbacks this afternoon? The top of the fourth inning, where we scored all four of our runs, as the team batted around and sent ten men to the plate. After singles by Tony Abreu and Stephen Drew started off the inning well, Russell Branyan clubbed a three-run shot to right, leveling the score at 3-3. We weren't finished, adding an RBI single from Gerardo Parra, and then loading the bases up again, with only one out, through a fly-ball from Kelly Johnson and an Abreu ground-out meant no further damage was possible.
The bad? Just about everything else, as the Rockies scored against us in every inning from the second through the sixth. Joe Saunders allowed three hits in the second, including a two-run homer. Brian Sweeney gave up a sacrifice fly in the third. After we'd taken the lead back, Juan Gutierrez immediately returned it to its previous owner with a two-run fourth, though wasn't helped by a run-scoring passed ball from Miguel Montero, while Wade Miley allowed two runs in his two innings. The afternoon was finished off by Mike Hampton loading the bases in the seventh, albeit escaping unscathed, and Carlos Rosa faced the minimum in the eighth, with the help of a double-play
As well as the passed ball, the Diamondbacks also committed four errors on the day. One was by home-run hero Branyan, Miley was charged with one on a pick-off, and Konrad Schmidt completed the tally with two throwing errors. Drew was 2-for-3, and Willie Bloomquist got hits in both his plate appearances, after coming into the game at third-base. We had our chances, but went 2-for-11 with runners in scoring position; the K:BB ratio was 6:4 for our hitters, while our pitchers produced three of each as our record dropped to 1-4. Hey, at least this one wasn't a one-run game...
Tomorrow is a split-squad game, with the team facing both the Mariners and the Giants. Scheduled pitchers in each game are as follows. Against the Mariners: Aaron Heilman, Sam Demel, Joe Paterson, Leyson Septimo, Matt Gorgen, Kevin Mulvey and Rafael Rodriguez. Against the Giants: Zach Duke, Josh Collmenter, Micah Owings, Zach Kroenke, David Hernandez, Yonata Ortega and Daniel Stange.