Game #20 Preview: 4/28, Arizona Diamondbacks vs. Colorado Rockies

Kyle Kendrick RHP, 1-2, 6.85

Archie Bradley RHP, 2-0, 1.45

Charlie Blackmon - CF	A.J. Pollock - CF
Corey Dickerson - LF	Chris Owings - SS
Troy Tulowitzki - SS	Paul Goldschmidt - 1B
Justin Morneau - 1B	Mark Trumbo - RF
Nolan Arenado - 3B	David Peralta - LF
Carlos Gonzalez - RF	Yasmany Tomas - 3B
Nick Hundley - C	Aaron Hill - 2B
DJ LeMahieu - 2B	Tuffy Gosewisch - C
Kyle Kendrick - RHP	Archie Bradley - RHP

I suppose some hope can be taken in that, if you cross off the first inning last night, we actually outscored the Rockies, 4-2. Perhaps that gives some kind of indication we've turned the corner, considering than in the 28 innings to that point, we were outscored by a 17-2 margin, it's safe to say things couldn't gave got much worse. But there's a reason they play the games over nine innings. I'm not sure what it is but I'm sure there is one. Though it might be interesting if baseball was to adopt different scoring. Say, start doing it like ski-jumping, and drop the runs scored in the highest and lowest-scoring frames. Might avoid too many excessive blowouts and the dullness which results.

Another approach might be petanque scoring, which would certainly reduce game length, eliminating useless at-bats that don't affect the outcome. The away team bats first and gets the usual three outs whether they score or not. The home team then bats but keeps going until they take the lead; that might take anywhere from 0 to 26 outs: if they use up all 27, the game is over. As soon as the home team take the lead, the away team takes over and starts batting. This back and forth continues until one team uses up all of their 27 outs without being able to take the lead. If the winners have only used, say, 21, that's basically two pointless half-innings saved.

Hmm, might have to come up with a more coherent proposal. After all, I can just suggest it'll stop pitchers from getting injured and I'm sure the likes of Craig Calcaterra will be fully behind it... Mind you, it's also perhaps a sad reflection on the state of the Diamondbacks this week, that figuring out massive revisions to the game of baseball is more interesting than trying to come up with a meaningful preview for this evening's contest. Still, it's Archie Bradley starting, so that should be worth a look, at least for a bit. Failing that, well, there's still plenty of stuff sitting on the DVR, staring at me with come-hither eyes...