Diamondbacks Gameday Thread, #98: 7/21 @ Reds

Roster moves

The Arizona Diamondbacks made the following roster moves:

• Reinstated LHP Andrew Chafin from the Paternity List.
• Optioned LHP Joe Mantiply to Triple-A Reno following yesterday’s game.

Not that you probably noticed Joe’s presence, since he never took the mound during his brief return to the 25-man roster. It might be fun to go through the transaction log this year and see what other players for the team have had “phantom” call-ups like this, which are not reflected in the Pitching Gamelog. Well, for some loose definition of “fun”, anyway.

Meanwhile, the most hotly-anticipated battle of the box-office arrives in cinemas, with the releases of both Barbie and Oppenheimer today. I can’t think of many movies which have generated quite so much buzz in the post-pandemic era. Congratulations to the marketing teams behind both of them. We will, however, not be seeing either movie, largely because we do not like crowded theaters, and I suspect both films will be seeing a lot of them this weekend. Sunday is currently vague-planned for the awkwardly titled Mission: Impossible - Dead Reckoning, Part One, which somehow manages to beat Lara Croft: Tomb Raider - The Cradle of Life for most unnecessary punctuation in a film’s name.

I’d not be surprised if the balls fly out of the fun-sized Great American Ballpark. The last couple of seasons, there’s always been one game here where out pitchers just cough it up. On June 7 last year, Tyler Gilbert and pals allowed five home-runs in just eight innings of work, and in April 2022, Taylor Widener and crew went one better, allowing six. The D-backs did at least win that one, prevailing 14-11. I think we’ve already had our share of that kind of game on this road trip. But today’s starter Tommy Henry is quite home-run prone, having given up a dozen in 78.2 innings of work. Though he hasn’t allowed one this month, so we’ll see what happens!