Snake Bytes 9/26: The Serpents

Arizona Diamondbacks 7, Los Angeles Dodgers 2

[Arizona Sports] Ketel Marte, Carson Kelly homer to lead D-backs past Dodgers 7-2 - Ketel Marte and Carson Kelly homered early off Clayton Kershaw, Zac Gallen pitched one-run ball for six innings and the Arizona Diamondbacks kept the Los Angeles Dodgers from reaching 100 wins by beating them 7-2 on Saturday night. The Dodgers (99-56) remain behind first-place San Francisco in the NL West race. The second-place team will host the NL wild-card game on Oct. 6, likely against the St. Louis Cardinals, who have won a franchise-record 15 consecutive games. Gallen (3-10), who hadn’t won since Aug. 26 against Philadelphia, struck out six in the first two innings. Marte, who finished with three of the Diamondbacks’ nine hits, homered to left field on Kershaw’s first pitch. Kelly led off the second inning with a drive into the Arizona bullpen in left. Each batter got his 13th home run of the season for the Diamondbacks, tied for the major league lead with 105 losses and just 2-8 in their previous 10 games.

[AZ Central] Gallen, Marte help Diamondbacks slow down Dodgers - If Zac Gallen’s outing on Saturday night wasn’t his best of the year, it wasn’t more than a notch below. Either way, it ranked atop another category, one that was evident from Gallen’s tone of voice during a postgame session with reporters: It was his most gratifying. “Yeah, I’d say that’s probably a good word,” he said after firing six impressive innings in a 7-1 win over the Los Angeles Dodgers. “The numbers tell one story, but I know how I feel and I know going into the last start, going into the offseason, I kind of knocked down a pretty big wall and overcame some hurdles from a feeling standpoint, delivery standpoint, that will give me something to work on and concentrate on going into the offseason.”

[D’backs.com] Ahmed supporting D-backs from sidelines - As the D-backs beat the Dodgers, 7-2, on Saturday night, shortstop Nick Ahmed sat in the home dugout at Chase Field wearing a hoodie and desperately wanting to be part of the action. Inflammation in his right shoulder — bursitis, Ahmed said it’s been diagnosed as — has kept him off the field since Sept. 17 and has likely ended his season, but Ahmed isn’t ready to call it quits with seven games left on the schedule. “I’m not going to make a decision on that now,” Ahmed said. “Candidly, just spoke with [manager] Torey [Lovullo] about what my status kind of does to our roster. Obviously, that can be a concern at times — knowing that if I’m not healthy to take an at-bat or swing or play, we’re down a man.”

Around the League

[MLB.com] Braves win in 10 to keep Phillies at bay - Still riding the high created by the game-tying homer and game-winning single he produced in a 10-8 victory over the Padres on Saturday night, Braves outfielder Jorge Soler was introduced to a new level of postgame enthusiasm as he made his way toward the visitors’ clubhouse at Petco Park. “The energy was sky high, like I’ve never seen it before,” Soler said through an interpreter. “We were working our way back to the clubhouse, and people were hooting and hollering and screaming. It was a big win.” Every win is big this time of year for a postseason contender like the Braves, who maintained their National League East lead at 1 1/2 games and cut the magic number to clinch the division to seven. But this may indeed have been Atlanta’s biggest win to date, simply because the team was one out away from it possibly being an influential loss.

[MLB.com] Cards escape inning with one-of-a-kind DP - From the big home runs and strikeouts to all the little plays in between, the Cardinals are doing everything right during their Modern Era franchise record 15-game win streak. And it was one of those little plays that came up huge during St. Louis’ 8-5 triumph over the Cubs for win No. 15 on Saturday. The Cardinals led, 5-4, but the Cubs had runners on the corners with one out in the bottom of the eighth when Rafael Ortega bounced a grounder to first baseman Paul Goldschmidt. St. Louis’ Gold Glove Award winner [Goldy has only won Gold Gloves with AZ, not STL.] fired home to catcher Yadier Molina to force David Bote, the potential game-tying run, into a rundown. Molina relayed to third baseman Nolan Arenado, who tagged Bote for the second out of the inning. Arenado then spun and fired to second baseman Tommy Edman, who threw back to Molina before the backstop found center fielder Harrison Bader charging into second base.

[ESPN] Woman, 2-year-old son killed in fall at Petco Park ahead of San Diego Padres game - San Diego police are investigating the deaths of a woman and her 2-year-old son Saturday after they fell from the third level of Petco Park, just as thousands of baseball fans were heading inside for a Padres game, the San Diego Union-Tribune reported. The woman, 40, and boy were pronounced dead at 4:11 p.m., about 20 minutes after police were alerted to the incident, Lt. Andra Brown told the newspaper. The pair fell from the third-level concourse — the equivalent of six stories high — to the sidewalk below on Tony Gwynn Drive, Brown said. Their names were not released; both lived in San Diego. The mother and child had been at a dining/concession area on the concourse level before the fall, Lt. Adam T. Sharki said. The child’s father was at the ballpark when the deaths occurred, police reported.

[MLB Trade Rumors] Mike Trout Confirms End Of His 2021 Season - Mike Trout officially confirmed what has been looking more and more obvious for some weeks now — he won’t play again in the 2021 season. The decision was actually made a few weeks ago, Trout told MLB.com’s Rhett Bollinger and other reporters, as Trout was never able to fully recover from the right calf strain that first sent him to the injured list back in May. “My body wasn’t allowing it. It’s been a grind and it’s been tough for me….My mind and what I wanted was telling me one thing and my body was telling me something else,” Trout said. “I was feeling really good in workouts and then [the calf] would get sore on me. It’s been a tough September for me. If we were in the race, it might be different and maybe I could play through it. But it got to the point where I needed a rehab assignment and had two weeks left and just looking at the bigger picture, it was smarter to get it right and get ready for Spring Training.”

[CBS Sports] Giancarlo Stanton’s late-inning grand slam lifts Yankees past Red Sox; rivals now tied for top wild card spot - The Yankees’ trailed for most of Saturday’s key contest against the rival Red Sox at Fenway Park, but a clutch Giancarlo Stanton grand slam in the eighth inning flipped the script and lifted New York to a 5-3 critical win. Stanton turned around that first-pitch fastball from Darwinzon Hernandez and sent it off the bat at 114.1 mph. It wound up traveling 452 feet. Just prior to Stanton’s mighty swing, the Yankees had a 31.8 percent chance of wining this game. After the ball cleared the Green Monster, they had a 90.5 percent chance of winning. It’s the first Yankees grand slam at Fenway Park since Nick Swisher hit one in April 2012. It’s the first go-head grand slam hit by a Yankee at Fenway in the eighth inning or later since Johnny Blanchard’s in 1961. Joe DiMaggio in 1948 is the only other Yankee to pull off that particular feat.