Diamondbacks 12, Cubs 4: Goldy Cooks in Cook County

Hey gang! Let's watch this baseball game here at 4:10 in the afternoon. Let's just turn it on right now and-

Oh, a rain delay. Well, let's wait this out!

Michael Haggins - Daybreak (via Zaid SE)

Hooray, we're back! After two hours and twenty minutes of listening to Tim McCarver, the D'Backs game finally got underway. Jeff Samardzija started for the Cubs, and his first act as starting pitcher was giving up a leadoff home run to Gerardo Parra. That was Parra's fifth homer of the season, and the fourth on the leadoff at-bat of the game. Miguel Montero would get an infield single on what looked like the incorrect call at first base later in the inning that did not come around to score, but it's important to note here. Trust me.

Ian Kennedy took the mound and ran into a rocky start (Or a Rockies start, given their historical skill at pitching.) He gave up a leadoff "double" to David DeJesus. I say "Double" because the ball in question hit Jason Kubel's glove pretty squarely, but Kubel did not catch it. Kennedy then hit Starlin Castro with a pitch and walked Anthony Rizzo. Alfonso Soriano hit a sac-fly to tie the game up. Nate Schierholtz then took a pretty good low pitch and pulled it the other way to score two more to make it 2-1 Cubs and then Wellington Castillo had an RBI groundout to make it 3-1.

In the top half of the second with one out, A.J. Pollock was called safe on ball hit in the infield. Replays showed he might have been out. Well Cubs manager Dale Sveum was having none of that, and proceeded to get himself ejected by Country Joe West. A Willie Bloomquist single, his first hit of the season in his first at-bat, and a Parra walk loaded up the bases for Didi Gregorius against Samardiajskflksjsefdska. Didi struck out, however. This happened again in the top of the fifth, except with Martin Prado striking out. Striking out against Jeff S. was a thing the D'Backs did quite a bit of tonight. Eleven times, to be exact.

Kennedy, to his credit, calmed down a bit after his rough first. In fact, he retired 17 batters in a row after that, and only allowed one more hit for the rest of his outing.

Samardzija was dealing, but his pitch count was getting high, and he went out for the seventh inning over 100 pitches. He would walk Parra and Paul Goldschmidt. That did it for Samar and the lefty James Russell was brought in. He got Miguel Montero to pop-up, but walked Martin Prado. Jason Kubel was up. Sure, by now you're thinking "Gee, shouldn't Cody Ross pinch-hit here? Bases loaded, two outs, yeah? Yeah?" You would be wrong, as Kubel corked one into the alley to clear the bases and make it 4-3 D'Backs.

Now, remember when I said that Kennedy would only give up one more hit? It was two paragraphs ago. That one hit happened to be a solo homer by Schierholtz to tie the game up. Kennedy got the next three batters in short order but the damage was done... for the Cubs, it was just beginning for the Diamondbacks.

In the bottom of the eighth Carlos Marmol came in for a high-leverage situation. That's the punchline. He gave up a leadoff walk to Bloomquist, who historically almost never walks. After Eric Hinske, pinch-hitting for Kennedy, flied out, Parra came up and ripped a double into center that score Bloomquist! Or, at least it would have if the Cubs had not decided to do the weird thing and GROW PLANTS ON THEIR OUTFIELD WALL. The ball got lost in the ivy and it was a ground-rule double and Bloomquist had to stop at third, despite the fact that he would have scored easily ivy or no. Didi patiently drew another walk from Marmol to load the bases. Paul Goldschmidt came up and made Marmol pay. He hammered a 1-1 Slider deep into the bleachers in center for his first regular season Grand Slam! Completionist nerds will note that Goldy had a Grand Slam in the 2011 NLDS against the Brewers. I would sum up the Diamondbacks against Marmol as follows:

Stop, stop he's already dead (via atlarock)

That would be enough for the D'Backs. They would add four more in the ninth off of sacrificial lamb Zach Putnam. David Hernandez and Matt Reynolds would pitch 1-2-3 innings in the eighth and ninth innings, respectively, and the D'Backs came away with a win!