Dbacks 4, Astros 5: TOOTBLANS and Walkoffs

One bad inning is all it takes for this team to unravel. Robbie Ray was pitching well until he wasn't and the offense threatened early before taking the rest of the night off.

Things started off well for the Dbacks, with the first 3 batters reaching base. Unfortunately both Jean Segura and Michael Bourn were erased trying to advance on the base paths. Lamb would strike out to end the inning and strand Goldy at 2nd.

The offense would thraten again in the 3rd, with Brandon Drury and Segura hitting back to back singles. After a Bourn fly out moved Drury to 3rd, Brandon would come in to score on a wild pitch to give Arizona an early lead 1-0. Goldy smashed a liner to left, but was robbed of a hit by a sliding grab.

Robbie Ray worked around trouble most of the night, stranding runners in scoring position in 3 of the 4 innings before finally succumbing to the pressure with 2 outs in the 5th. Jose Altuve doubled to left and Correa lined a single to right, with Altuve just beating the throw to the plate to tie the game at 1. Evan Gattis showed his strength, driving a ball near his toes just below the train tracks in left for a 2-run homer. Another single followed, before Valbuena struck out to end the 5th and Ray's start.

Ray pitched exactly like his line indicated, with the 6 hits and 3 runs allowed a decent start. It seemed like Ray struggled to recover after getting hit by a broken bat early on, but he would never admit to that. He ended the day with 99 pitches thrown and fell behind in counts too often to be effective. Still, he struck out 6 and walked only 2 and kept the D-backs in the game despite the offense being terrible.

The bullpen was solid in relief, keeping the deficit at 3-1 until Zac Curtis struggled for the first time since his call up. He hit the first batter, walked the next and got Gomez to fly out to center before giving way to Ziegler. Tony Kemp pinch hit and smacked the first pitch deep onto the warning track in left field to score the runner and extend the lead to 4-1.

With the game on the line, the offense finally responded. Segura was hit by a pitch and Bourn drilled a double to right, scoring Segura easily and making things 4-2. Goldy lined a ball right at the 1st baseman, who made a leaping grab to rob a hit. With 1 out, team savior Jake Lamb smacked a deep drive to right off Gregerson to tie things up at 4-4 and push their closer out of the game. Weeks blooped a single to center to keep the threat alive, but Hermann and Owings failed to produce and ended the inning with the game tied. Free Baseball!

The offense continued with it's anemic performance, going down easy in the 10th and 11th. Tyler Clippard was pressed into multiple inning duty and was great for the first 1 2/3rds innings before giving up a home run to George Springer in the 11th with 2 outs. Oh well, good job good effort.

Source: FanGraphs

Taking the extra base - Jake lam (+22.9%)

TOOTBLAN - Tyler Clippard (-23.2%)

Lively group tonight in the GameThread despite the early TOOTBLANS and Robbie Ray ineffectiveness. Comment of the thread goes to shoewizard who predicted this unbelievable outcome.

Early game tomorrow, with first pitch scheduled for 11:10 AM AZ time. Stop on by and talk some baseball!