Diamondbacks 6, Brewers 15: There Were Olympics On, Too

Matt Garza had a good outing and Ryan Braun blasted a couple of home runs as the Brewers demolished the Diamondbacks in a game that wasn’t nearly as close as the score makes it seem. Yep, even a nine run differential doesn’t cover how bad the game was.

The Diamondbacks decided to pull out all the stops to get people to attend, turning tonight’s game into some sort of Pokemon event. They apparently succeeded, which is good, I guess. If you had wanted to watch a winning team, your best bet was Kerri Walsh Jennings and April Ross in the beach volleyball. If you weren’t staying home and watching that, I guess catching Pokemons at a place with a circus sideshow of a baseball game was a good alternative.

Patrick Corbin had the start for the Diamondbacks, and immediately ran into trouble. After the first two batters reached and a wild pitch put runners on second and third, two sacrifice flies made it 2-0. However, while Corbin didn’t exactly settle down, he did manage to avoid allowing runs to score, although he was pitching in and out of trouble for the rest of his evening. How much trouble? The first two reached in the second. After retiring one, the next two reached in the third. He allowed a one-out double in the fourth, and stranded two more runners in the fifth. After the first two reached in the sixth, Corbin was replaced by Evan Marshall.

Marshall promptly gave up a three-run home run to Ryan Braun, and more trouble followed, as the next two also reached. A double play helped matters, but Marshall gave up one more run before finally escaping the sixth inning. But a reasonable 2-0 deficit had turned into a 6-0 deficit.

As mentioned above, the Diamondbacks were facing Matt Garza. At this stage of his career, Garza is not a good pitcher. Going into today, current Diamondbacks (including pitchers!) had a .748 OPS against Garza, although he seems to be the only Brewer Goldy doesn’t own. They couldn’t hit Garza today. Through five, Jake Lamb’s single was the only hit.

The Diamondbacks finally had an opportunity in the sixth. Phil Gosselin pinch hit for Marshall, and blooped a double that fell within five feet of three Brewers. Michael Bourn drew a walk, as did Lamb, loading the bases for Tomas. Tomas hit the ball fairly hard, but right to Chris Carter at first base to end the threat.

Dominic Leone took over in the seventh inning, as part of Chip Hale’s grand plan to secure the first pick in the draft. Leone came through perfectly (if that was indeed the plan) serving up another three-run blast to Braun.

Brandon Drury reached on an error for the second time to lead off the seventh, and Welington Castillo followed with a home run to left, finally putting the D-backs on the board. (Shockingly, despite good numbers against Garza, this was the first home run by a current Diamondback against Garza.) A walk to Tuffy Gosewisch (pinch hitting for Leone) ended Garza’s night. Jhan Marinez came on, and served up Jean Segura’s 10th homer of the year, pulling the Diamondbacks to 9-4.

Randall Delgado managed a scoreless inning in the eighth despite allowing quite a few baserunners. Adam Loewen couldn’t do the same in the ninth, as he only managed two outs and the Brewers pushed their lead to 11-4. Zack Godley (apparently out of the rotation with Zack Greinke’s impending return) came on to get the final out. However, he apparently had directions from the Pokemon overlords to make the game last longer, and complained about the condition of the mound, leading to a delay. It didn’t help, as Andy Wilkins doubled in two more (both charged to Loewen) and Jonathan Villar singled in two more. He finally got out of the inning, but the Diamondbacks were down 15-4.

Winning baseball is certainly not here. And it doesn’t appear that it will be here any time in the near future. At this point, I’d settle for relevance, but I somehow expect that this Pokemon Go fad will prove more relevant and sustainable than any success the Diamondbacks will experience this decade. Oh, Goldy made it 15-5 with a double, Lamb made it 15-6 with a single. That made Taco Bell execs happy, as they got their advertising.

Fairly busy GDT, although not nearly as busy as if the team were contending.

No comment of the thread, as nothing changed color. We are going the way of the D-backs, and just showing up for games, apparently.

Source: FanGraphs

Pidgeys: Jake Lamb, 3.3%; Phil Gosselin, 1.9%

Wasted all the Pokeballs: Evan Marshall, -9.7%

It is indicative of how much a team loss this was that no one was in double-digits in either the positive or the negative. Even Marshall’s -9.7% is at least partially the fault of Corbin allowing two runners to reach base.