Arizona Diamondbacks Game Preview, #61: Is it O'Brien Time?

Matt Moore LHP, 2-3, 5.46

Zack Greinke RHP, 7-3, 4.29

Taylor Motter - 3B	Jean Segura - 2B
Brad Miller - SS	Michael Bourn - CF
Desmond Jennings - CF	Paul Goldschmidt - 1B
Logan Morrison - 1B	Welington Castillo - C
Mikie Mahtook - RF	Brandon Drury - RF
Corey Dickerson - LF	Jake Lamb - 3B
Tim Beckham - 2B	Yasmany Tomas - LF
Hank Conger - C	Zack Greinke - RHP
Matt Moore - LHP	Nick Ahmed - SS

Peter O'Brien had two more hits this afternoon for the Aces against the Salt Lake Bees - for whom Goldie's chew-toy, Tim Lincecum, started and took the loss. That's 50 games with Reno now for O'Brien, and his line is .337/.362/.683 for an 1.045 OPS. Sure, his defense may be questionable, as is his plate-discipline (that's a K:BB ratio of 59:9). But he is, at least hitting the ball, unlike Yasmany Tomas, who seems to have all the same weaknesses as O'Brien, with the major disadvantage of hitting jack over the past four weeks. Since May 11, when he was batting .318, Tomas is hitting .173, with a .518 OPS. His last walk was May 24: he has fifteen strikeouts since then. Might be time for a change...

Meanwhile, Chip Hale must have been bundled into a closet and tied up with duct-tape, before being able to make out this afternoon's line-up, because it includes Jake Lamb against a left-hander. As we've seen a couple of times recently, Hale has a near-pathological aversion to this, preferring to send up Rickie Weeks Jr with the game on the line. The last time Lamb saw a left-hander in a situation that could be described as "late and close" was probably May 14, in the 7th inning against the Giants, when he faced Josh Osich, representing the go-ahead run. So we'll see how long of a leash Lamb gets this evening.

We'll also see how Greinke responds after Robbie Ray stole his home-run thunder last night, with the first long-ball by a Diamondbacks' pitcher in over three years. Though ahead of Ray, Greinke is actually trailing Patrick Corbin in terms of OPS, .644 to .724. Both men have been worth 0.3 bWAR at the plate this year, which is kinda embarrassing for Corbin, because that's rather more than he has been worth as a pitcher (-0.1 bWAR). To this point, Daniel Hudson (1.0 bWAR) has been the team's most valuable pitcher, but if Greinke has another start like last time, he'll likely take over that title by the end of the night. We can but hope, anyway.