Record: 55-53. Pace: 82-80. Change over last year: 0.
Counting tonight, Yu Darvish has struck out 14 batters in an MLB game 4 times. 2 of those games were against the Diamondbacks. This year. What happened to building a team that wouldn't 'waste outs' on strikeouts? (Joke's on you, rhetorical question, as Yu Darvish strikes everyone out, even Ryan Gosling with a kitten and vegan cable knit sweater).
Yu Darvish is a special pitcher, and the Diamondbacks were forced to submit to his awesome power today. He went 7 innings, struck out 14, and gave up 5 hits. Oh yeah, he also gave up 0 runs and 0 walks. Talk about a 'drop the mic' kind of performance.
Zeke Spruill, the poor rookie called up to start after Ian Kennedy was banished to the Land of the Sex Den, did not fare nearly as well. He only went 4 innings, gave up 5 runs on 7 hits and 3 walks, and only struck out 3. If one of the aims of dumping Kennedy was moving pitchers that couldn't consistently go deeper into the game, we might want to reconsider our options.
The Rangers jumpstarted the scoring in the bottom of the second with a AJ Pierzynski nut shot a trainer solo home run. Oddly enough, the first 3 Rangers runs were all off solo shots: Pierzynski, Mitch Moreland in the 3rd, and David Murphy in the 4th. Then Texas decided to switch things up by scoring 2 runs off a Leonys Martin double in the 4th, extending their lead to 5-0.
Obviously I don't need to pretend there was ever any danger that the lead would be breached like a kaiju through a wall. The Diamondbacks only made it slightly interesting in the 9th, and let's be frank: it was more of a pity run than anything else. Cody Ross hit a single, moved to second on fielder's indifference, then was brought around on a Martin Prado single. And that's the game, folks.
On paper it almost appears the D-backs had chances, but merely squandered them away. 6 left-on-base, that's not good, right? Well, we only had a runner get to second or further 4 times, so even the few times they were getting on base, the Diamondbacks weren't going anywhere.
And so that concludes that prior series from the end of May. Rain delays and postponements are weird. Everyone just get a damn roof or something.
Source: FanGraphs
Gameday Thread was about as busy as I'd expect a late afternoon curb stomping would be. We combined our powers for over 400 comments, but no one breached 100 comments. Top commenter was asteroid, and she was joined by: 4 Corners Fan, AJV19, AzDbackfanInDc, AzRattler, BulldogsNotZags, Circa4life, Clefo, FatBoysEatMeat, Gildo, GuruB, Jim McLennan, JoeCB1991, Paper Clip, RobbieFVK, SongBird, The so-called Beautiful, Turambar, azcougs, azshadowwalker, cheese1213, cole8865, hotclaws, onedotfive, piratedan7, preston.salisbury, rd33, shoewizard, since_98, snakecharmer, soco, and xmet.
Tomorrow the AL Road Trip continues, with a stop in Boston. Sunday the D-backs will be on TBS, so just a heads up or wev. Friday's game starts at 4:10pm Arizona time, so be ready to eat a lobster roll or something. I don't really know Bostonians do beyond rob banks with Ben Affleck.