Diamondbacks 5, Reds 2 - All-Stars Shine

Record: 65-59. Pace: 85-77. NL West: -7.5

This game started out in the quietest way imaginable, with the first nine Diamondbacks and first six Reds sitting down in order. In fact, every out but one was either in the air or a strikeout, with only one groundout to the pitcher Patrick Corbin among those first 15 outs. Devin Mesoraco was the first baserunner in the game, doubling to lead off the bottom half of the third inning. He was stranded at third.

Arizona got the first run of the game, and it came in a very peculiar 4th inning. With one out, Martin Prado homered to put the Diamondbacks up 1-0. Paul Goldschmidt worked a walk, then got picked off of first base, his fifth caught stealing of the year. With two outs, Aaron Hill doubled. The trainers then visited Cincinnati starter Tony Cingrani and removed him from the game with a lower back strain. Alfredo Simon came in in relief and pitched for the Reds through the 6th inning.

Through six full innings of work, Patrick Corbin had allowed just two hits and no walks. After a leadoff single in the 4th inning, Corbin sat down 10 Reds in a row, with four strikeouts. He ended up scattering six hits total, without giving up a walk, and striking out 10 batters. He left runners on the corners to end the Reds' 7th inning, but ran into a little trouble in the 8th. He gave up a single to Zack Cozart, followed up by a two-run home run to Chris Heisey, for the Reds' only runs.

Before Cincinnati's half of the 8th inning, though, was Arizona's, and those two runs from Heisey didn't end up mattering at all. Sam LeCure gave up three straight singles to Corbin, A.J. Pollock and Prado, loading the bases in front of Paul Goldschmidt. Do you know what Paul Goldschmidt likes to do with the bases loaded? If you said "Hit grand slams," you would be correct! Goldy blasted his third grand slam this year, and drove home RBIs 97-100 (now leading the NL) to make it, at the time, 5-0 Diamondbacks.

So, the home run Corbin allowed in the 8th was regrettable but moot. Corbin bat for himself in the top of the 9th, and pitched a clean 1-2-3 bottom of the 9th for his second complete game victory this season.

Source: FanGraphs

Hero of Canton: P Corbin, +54.5% (combined)
Has Superhero Powers: M Prado, +14.4%; P Goldschmidt, +7.2%
Lowest on the Totem Pole: G Parra, -6.9%

As expected with an early start time and a low-scoring game, it was a quiet gameday thread, with only 250 total comments. Zavada's Moustache and melliemacker were the top two, with the next three people tied at only 20 posts apiece. All present were: BulldogsNotZags, CaptainCanuck, Clefo, Diamondhacks, Fangdango, FatBoysEatMeat, GODSCHMIDT, GuruB, Jim McLennan, Lozenge, The so-called Beautiful, Zavada's Moustache, asteroid, azshadowwalker, blue bulldog, cheese1213, cole8865, hotclaws, imstillhungry95, melliemacker, onedotfive, piratedan7, rapdawg, rd33, soco, and xmet.

Same bat time, same bat channel, tomorrow night!