Diamondbacks 10, Rockies 9

Ketel Marte homered from both sides of the plate for the 3rd time this season, his 8th and 9th on the year, leading the charge for the Diamondbacks as they pounded out 10 runs and 4 homers against Rockies pitching.

Wilmer Flores opened the scoring again for the Diamondbacks with a two run double in the second. Marte hit the first of his two homers on the night in the 3rd, driving in Adam Jones who lead off the inning with a double.

Robbie Ray pitched well tonight. After allowing a leadoff single in the first, he retired 9 of the next 10 hitters and struck out 5. But in the 4th inning, and working with a 4 run lead, his defense failed him. Ray allowed a one out double to Nolan Arenado and walked Mark Reynolds. He then induced what should have been an inning ending double play ground ball to second base. However the infield was in the shift and Nick Ahmed, coming from an awkward angle, missed the bag again, as he did in the Yankee series. This time he got caught on replay, and the bases were loaded. Another error by Eduardo Escobar and the Rockies had their first run. Singles by Chris Iannetta and Garret Hampson plated three more, and the score was tied at 4. All 4 runs were unearned.

The Diamondbacks answered right back in the 5th. Adam Jones leadoff the inning with a long homerun to left, his 6th. Marte singled for his second hit of the night, and then Eduardo Escobar hit his 6th HR of the year putting the DBacks back up 7-4.

Ray shut down the Rockies in their half of the 5th and got two outs in the 6th, but after giving up a single to Hampson was relieved by TJ McFarland, who was making his first appearance of the year. TJ immediately gave up a homer to pinch hitter Ryan McMahon and it was a one run game again.

Fortunately the Diamondbacks continued to tack on. Marte hit his second homerun of the game, a two run homer, scoring Adam Jones who broke out of his slump with a three hit night including the homer and a double. In the 8th the DBacks pushed across another run, with recently recalled pinch runner Tim Locastro scoring on the infamous contact play. That gave them a 10-6 lead.

But this is Coors Field. Yoan Lopez worked a scoreless 7th, as did Archie Bradley in the 8th. Andrew Chafin came on to pitch the 9th and promptly surrendered a single to McMahon and a two run homer to Charlie Blackmon, and suddenly it was a 10-8 game.

Greg Holland came on to try to close it out. He started off poorly, walking Trevor Story and giving up a groundball single to right field by Arenado, putting runners on the corners with nobody out. A walk to Mark Reynolds loaded the bases withthe 2 run lead hanging by a thread. David Dahl then hit a sharp groundball to Nick Ahmed who managed to snare it and get a force out at 2nd, but Story came home to score. Holland somehow managed to strike out Ian Desmond and Chris Iannetta to finally close it out and preserve the one run victory.

EDIT: I made a mistake last night and transposed Marte’s splits. Here they are for clarity

Just for good measure, both his homers traveled 442 feet. I think the question of whether his left handed power would develop is being emphatically answered.

Ray got his second win on the season, improving his record to 2-1, and lowering his ERA to 3.79 despite the four unearned runs.

The Win Expectancy chart is a rather harrowing image, as was the 9th inning:

Fangraphs Box Score

The Prince: Ketel Marte. +27.5%

Knights: Adam Jones +17.7%, Eduardo Escobar +14.6%, Greg Holland +12.1%

Villians: TJ McFarland -17.2%, Andrew Chafin - 9.4%

384 Comments by 22 posters today:

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No comments turned Red, but exercising privilege , I’m going with this appropriate comment to leadoff the thread:

Tomorrow nights game starts at 5:10, Luke Weaver to face Kyle Freeland