Arizona Diamondbacks Game Preview, #93: Walk-off wonderland

Kenta Maeda RHP, 8-6, 2.95

Robbie Ray LHP, 4-8, 4.81

Howie Kendrick - LF	Jean Segura - 2B
Corey Seager - SS	Michael Bourn - CF
Justin Turner - 3B	Paul Goldschmidt - 1B
Scott Van Slyke - 1B	Jake Lamb - 3B
Yasiel Puig - CF	Brandon Drury - LF
Chris Taylor - 2B	Mike Freeman - RF
A.J. Ellis - C	Tuffy Gosewisch - C
Zach Walters - RF	Nick Ahmed - SS
Kenta Maeda - RHP	Robbie Ray - LHP

If last night's victory doesn't give the Diamondbacks momentum, heading into the rubber game of this series, it's hard to think what could. Down to their final out - indeed their final strike - from a six-game losing streak, they battled back to tie the game, then win it on a walk-off, repelling wave after wave of Los Angeles Dodgers' base-runners. For a team that had reeled its way to the worst streak of results in a decade, as documented in yesterday's preview, it was thoroughly unexpected. I was literally in the middle of chronicling another defeat, when Lamb slapped that ball into the left-center gap.

It was the 125th walk-off victory in franchise history, but only the second of the season, following the one delivered by Yasmany Tomas on April 8th against the Cubs. That ties the record low for a single year, which we had in 2012; the record high is 13, the following season. It was the 17th walk-off against the Dodgers, which is the most we've managed against any other team. Luis Gonzales leads the team list with nine walk-off PAs, ahead of Matt Williams who had seven. Goldschmidt leads the current roster with five; no-one else present on the 2016 Diamondbacks has more than one to their name.

Hopefully, the D-backs will still be feeling good about themselves as a result, and if they don't wait until two outs in the ninth inning to score, I'd prefer it. Probably not going to be easy: we haven't done too well against Maeda in our previous two encounters. He has allowed two earned runs over 11.1 innings of work, on 11 hits, with two walks and ten strikeouts. However, Robbie Ray has handled the Dodgers well of late too: he's 2-0 over his last three starts, with a 1.04 ERA. That said, last time out, he walked five in 6.1 innings, and I'd rather we don't have to rely on Los Angeles going 1-for-15 with runners in scoring position once again!