Much though it may seem difficult to believe, by a lot of measures, the Arizona bullpen was not as horrifically ineffective as it seemed. Their ERA of 4.09 was equal sixth-best in the league, without any park adjustment, and batters' OPS against them was also better than the National League average. They weren't particularly "unlucky" either, with a BABIP exactly on the mean at .298. Yet, somehow, they posted a record of 17-28 over the season: As a comparison, Houston's bullpen had exactly the same ERA as us this year, but they went 26-23 - if the Diamondbacks had done that, we'd have won the league.

Even breaking it down to individual innings doesn't shed any particular light on things. Our worst inning, by quite some distance, was the first, where the opposition scored 92 times. Next was the third, at 86 - neither of these can be blame on the bullpen. The last three innings were down at 79, 77 and 74 runs respectively, and each of them was also almost spot-on the average OPS for the team (.716), with figures of .716, .715 and.718. Yet the team lost fifteen games they were winning after six innings - almost twice as many as the eight dropped last season, when the bullpen ERA was only fractionally better, at 3.95.

Again, that slump in results would be the difference between first and second, right there. It begins to look as if the bullpen was simply remarkably unclutch. They didn't allow a particularly large number of runs, but the ones they did had a nasty habit of proving crucial in deciding the outcome. The 'Late and Close' stat - 7th inning on with the batting team tied, ahead by one, or the tying run at least on deck - does give some hint of that. The team figure for OPS was .729, and it'd be higher if you remove our starters in that situation: Haren (.710), Davis (.675), Johnson (.650) and Webb (a stunning .538), who combined for about 20% of those at-bats. Some of our bullpen did thrive there, led by Qualls (.641) and Cruz (.655). Others didn't.

Here's are the stats for our seven top relievers, by innings pitched, and some comments on each.

         G  W-L  S   IP  ERA  H  R ER HR BB SO
Qualls  77  4-8  9 73.2 2.81 61 29 23  4 18 71
Pena    72  3-2  3 72.2 4.33 80 38 35  5 17 52
Lyon    61  3-5 26 59.1 4.70 75 34 31  7 13 44
Cruz    57  4-0  0 51.2 2.61 34 17 15  5 31 71
Slaten  45  0-3  0 32.1 4.73 33 20 17  4 14 20
Rosales 27  1-1  0 30   4.20 32 15 14  2 15 18
Rauch   26  0-6  1 23.1 6.56 27 18 17  6  9 22

Chad Qualls. Started the season very well, with a scoreless streak of 16.2 innings, and finished it almost as strong, with another one of 14.2 frames. In the middle, however, he had his struggles, most notable a spell where he suddenly couldn't stop inherited runners from scoring. From June 2-July 4, his own ERA was only 4.38, but he allowed eight of ten base-runners who were there when he arrived, to cross home-plate. He also was the victim of the defense: on May 7, he had an 0-3 record, despite an ERA under one, because six of the eight runs he'd allowed to that point were unearned. Probably was our best reliever, keeping opponents to a .601 OPS. Shame it took Melvin until mid-September to make him the closer.

Tony Pena. He was the Mark Reynolds of the bullpen; he would have a streak where he was incredible, then suddenly, would struggle in a way that made you wonder if he'd ever be good again. 40% of those earned runs came in just four outings. He was particularly good with two outs and runners in scoring position, holding opponents to a .184 average, and generally pitched much in close games. When tied or in one-run games, batters hit .203 in 153 at-bats; if the margin was two or more, the figure was .274, and when four or more, he seemed to give up entirely, with the OBA was all the way up to .333.

Brandon Lyon. Poor Brandon. Partly the victim of a .342 BABIP. Was it over-use? Pitching after working the night before, his ERA was 6.92, compared to 4.08 after a rest. We'll never know for sure, but his season imploded on July 19. ERA before that date: 2.37. From that date on: 8.86, and certainly, asking a reliever with known arm issues to throw 27and 28 pitches on consecutive days, seems a questionable decision by Melvin. A small nugget of hope: after being removed from the closer's role, he finished the season with six scoreless innings. I'm just glad it is not my decision whether to offer this free-agent arbitration or not this year, because I have no idea whether he would be worth the risk.

Juan Cruz. We got pretty much what you would expect from Cruz: lots of walks and a phenomenal strikeout rate, 12.37 per nine IP, trailing only Grant Balfour (12.65) among major-league pitchers with 25+ innings. He missed three weeks in July and, despite the best ERA of any of our relievers, seemed to fall out of favor with Melvin - there was a two-week spell in August where he threw just a single inning.  That came immediately after the game on the 9th, in which his throw to second led to Hudson's broken wrist. Cruz was particularly tough on left-handed batters, who hit a mere .159, with 35 strikeouts in only 82 at-bats. Like Lyon, he's now a free-agent: estimates suggest, unlike Lyon, he'll be a Type A, so would bring a very nice haul if he signed elsewhere.

Doug Slaten. Did a credible job at what he was supposed to do, retire left-handed batters, keeping them to a .232/.317/.375 line - though as noted above, Juan Cruz was even more effective. Leaving Slaten in there to face any right-handed batters was highly-questionable, as their OPS against him was a healthy .866. He had an odd home/road split: while the OPS was very similar (.801/.778), his ERA was far better away from Chase (6.48/2.87). Slaten saw very little action after the All-Star break, partly due to injury, but was also sent down to Tucson in late  August. That all combined to limit him to six innings of work in the second-half of the season.

Leo Rosales. Following his recovery from a broken hand caused by an argument with a wall, Rosales made his debut on June 15 and quietly had himself a decent little season. Though at age 27, he no longer really qualifies to be called a "prospect". Control was probably the main issue, allowing fifteen walks in only thirty innings, but over his first eighteen games and 21.1 innings, his ERA was a respectable 2.53. A couple of bad outing inflated his numbers in the last couple of months, but he is likely among the leading contenders for a full-time bullpen spot from Opening Day in 2009.

Jon Rauch. He picked up six losses for Arizona, in only 23.1 innings of work: as far as I can see, that's an all-time record [the nearest I could find were Jaime Navarro, who went 0-5 in 18.2 IP for the 2000 Brewers, and Ed Farmer, 0-6 in 26.2 IP for the 1983 Phillies]. The main reason is his ineffectiveness when the game was tied. Batters hit .320 (16-for-50), with an OPS of 1.027 - basically, with the scores level, Rauch made opposing hitters look like Manny Ramirez. That losses then ensued, is not really surprising. Small sample size? Probably. But I do not want to see him in any of those "close and late" situations, until he has proven the ability to retire batters when the game is not on the line.

Record: 80-80. Pace: 81-81. Change on last season: -10.

Dan Haren opted to follow in the footsteps of Brandon Webb's last start: have a disastrous first inning, then be steady as a rock thereafter. While, unlike Webb, Haren didn't quite manage to pick up the victory, he did give his team-mates a chance to climb back into things, with crucial two-run hits coming from, first, Justin Upton, and then a pinch-hit eighth-inning double by Chad Tracy that broke a 4-4 tie.

A win looked extremely unlikely in the first inning, where Haren couldn't get anyone out, and was not aided by the latest in a line of defensive blunders. He'd already allowed a walk and two doubles, retiring just one of four hitters faced, when he got Atkins to ground out weakly in front of home-plate. Montero moved forward to grab the ball and threw to Dunn at first. But Hawpe, who had been on second, noticed that no-one was now covering home, and motored all the way round, past third, to make the score 3-0 to Colorado. Why does it seem that we never get to benefit from that kind of astute base-running?

The offense got off to a shaky start too. We got men on - seven of our first nine outs were with runners aboard - but moving them over proved problematic, and as for any hits with someone in scoring position? Well, the story in the first half proved the same as we've seen, in all too great abundance, of late. However, Justin Upton clubbed his 15th homer of the year and Stephen Drew followed with a shot described by one of the commentators as "unbelievable." Er, it was his 21st of the year, meaning only Reynolds has more: that seems pretty believable to me, but whatever. It narrowed the gap to 3-2.

Meanwhile, Haren found the 'on' switch for his talent, to mow down the Rockies like summer hay. He struck out the side in the second, giving him 200 K's for the season. He took the ball in question from the umpire, but it looks like he made the fatal mistake of flipping it to Dunn - who, not realizing the significance of the souvenir, promptly lobbed it into the stands, If you have that baseball, please return it to D. Haren, c/o Chase Field. I'm sure he'd be very grateful. Dan allowed only three singles and no runs from the 2nd-6th, getting the last of his nine K's to open the seventh. He was tiring, however, and back-to-back doubles drove in a run for the Rockies. Still, he finished the night memorably, snagging a searing line drive off the bat of Smith, then calmly flipping to Drew covering second for the double-play.

A few thoughts on Haren, while I'm here. I can't agree with the Purple Row assertion that, "clearly Arizona had more in mind when it traded for him last winter." I beg to differ. Even though Haren was very unlucky - he had a 2.79 ERA in his nine no-decisions - his presence means that only one other NL team bar Arizona has two pitchers with 16+ wins [the Cubs, thanks to Dempster and Lilly]. His ERA+ of 137 is exactly the same as it was last season, and he set a career-high in strikeouts while posting a K:BB ratio of better than 5:1, the highest by any NL pitcher since 2004. No, I think that Haren has been everything that we wanted when Josh Byrnes pulled the trigger on him.

Mind you, the same PR piece says, "The Diamondbacks lacked the depth to deal with...the tired arm of Brandon Webb." Webb? Tired? He has won three consecutive starts, allowed four runs in 22 innings and threw 121 pitches last time out. The very least of our issues, this season in general and down the stretch in particular. Rox Girl also reckons we only have two years left, "before the effects of age start ravaging the current team and a weak farm system will cause it to collapse inward." Of course, if you read the off-season piece with her 2008 expectations, you'll know she's not exactly Nostradamus. I particularly liked this: "The Rockies, meanwhile, will have another decent middle of the rotation arm ready with Greg Reynolds should Ubaldo Jimenez succumb." Yeah, that Greg Reynolds: 2-8 with an 8.26 ERA in 13 starts, and ignominiously yanked from the start today.

The fourth Colorado run off Haren tied the game, as Arizona had finally got a couple a couple of hits with runners in scoring position. The team hit for the cycle in the fifth. After Drew's homer made it a one-run game, Eckstein doubled down the left-field line and Jackson singled him to third with a bullet. Justin Upton then drove a ball all the way to the wall in left-center, allowing both men to score. Drew and Eckstein each had two hits and a walk, while Upton and Miguel Montero delivered two hits. However, the biggest blow likely came in the eighth, after Montero doubled and Salazar walked. Chad Tracy came off the bench, hooked the ball down the right-field line into the corner, and two runs scored, giving Arizona a 6-4 lead.

Qualls nailed it down with a stress-free 1-2-3 ninth, on two strikeouts [yay - Thirsbusters all round!] and a weak groundout. He has another decent scoreless streak going, currently at 13.2 innings. In that time he has allowed six hits and one walk, while fanning eleven. Also worth noting, only one of the seven runners which he has inherited, have come around to score. Given that man was on third with nobody out when Qualls entered the game, we can hardly blame him for that. I feel that I am recovering from my mid-season attack of Q-fever [the symptom of which was nausea whenever he appeared out of the bullpen] and am now feeling okay with the prospect of him closing for us next year.

Quickly: among D-backs with 150+ AB this year, who has the highest OPS? Congratulations if you answered Stephen Drew, whose .838 passed Conor Jackson (.829) and Justin Upton (.833) last night. To continue this quiz-themed paragraph, it's time for a spot of Baseball Jeopardy. What are Stephen Drew and Hanley Ramirez? No, not "Your mother," Mr. Connery. The correct answer is, "The only major-league shortstops with an OPS better than .835 and 200+ PAs this season." Drew's figure is more than 50 points above reigning MVP Jimmy Rollins (.787), Derek Jeter (.771) or Miguel Tejada (.732). He really deserves to get some MVP love of his own this winter.

Game Notes

[Click to enlarge, in new window]
Master of his domain: Chad Tracy, +34.4%
Extremely-honorable mention: Justin Upton, +30.4%
Honorable mention: Cruz, +10.9%; Drew, +10.4%
God-emperor of suck: Adam Dunn, -18.4%
Dishonorable mention: Dan Haren, -11.6%

Looked like a fun and active Gameday Thread [final tally: Snakepit 415 comments, Purple Row, 27]: despite the political undertones, everything remained civil, so kudos to all concerned for that. There are many sites that won't even permit mention of political topics, for the ferocious nature of the results; I'm glad to see we don't have to be one of them Present were Azreous, DbacksSkins, kishi, snakecharmer, emilylovesthedbacks, soco, Zephon, TwinnerA, Scrbl, nargel, foulpole, AZWILDCATS, unnamedDBacksfan, 4 Corners Fan and damdrs1717.

interesting piece suggesting that Montero could see some playing time at third-base next year. He'll be working on that - probably in the Venezuelan winter league, but possibly also in the Arizona Fall League - during the off-season, and the aim is clearly to try and get his left-handed bat into the line-up more often, an area which the Diamondbacks have been perilously thin this year. Might make things even tougher for Chad Tracy - one wonders if this is the precursor to an off-season trade of him? I have a feeling we could be selling low on a player once again, and that he is still not quite 100% back from his knee surgery. But there's something of a domino theory in effect: Tracy's future could, quite possibly, depend on whether ownership manages to shift Eric Byrnes this off-season.

Record: 79-80. Pace: 80-82. Change on last season: -10.
Elimination number: 0. Playoff odds: finally, mercifully, zero.

I'm not particularly picking on Yusmeiro Petit here. After all, it was our illustrious manager who chose to send the most homer-prone pitcher in the history of the Diamondbacks out there to face Albert Pujols and Ryan Ludwick, who started the day tied for seventh and fourth in the National League for homers. The back-to-back long balls which resulted were almost inevitable: the Petit Unit also let consecutive Cards hitters do the same thing, the last time he faced them. That was barely three weeks ago, on September 2nd - which is when the picture above was taken.

Still, allowing two homers, while retiring only one of four batters faced, probably counts as the worst outing in a line of particularly-ripe performances from the relief corps this afternoon. They allowed nine earned runs in just four innings on ten hits and four walks. How appropriate that our bullpen was tagged for the loss that ended our post-season hopes, running their 2008 record to 15-28. Every other team in the NL has at least twenty wins from its relievers: that's our deficit, right there

This was a sound thrashing of the highest order, exposing all of the Diamondbacks' frailties, as the Cardinals pounded our seventeen hits and took nine walks in only eight innings. Meanwhile, our batters managed only four hits, with Dunn the only D-back to reach base safely more than once. He walked, and also hammered his 39th homer of the season to lead off the second, making it a two-run game at that point. Arizona took the lead - yes, it's difficult to believe that, bases on the final score - when Reynolds singled home both Dunn and Justin Upton in the top of the fourth.

It didn't last long. A one-out triple in the bottom half of the same inning, brought the Cardinals right back level, and though Leo Rosales worked out of a bases-loaded jam with no outs in the fifth, that was only a stay of execution. A sacrifice fly from Pujols put them ahead in the sixth; they added another run that frame, then poured on five more runs in the seventh, off the P-squad of relievers. That's Peña, Petit and Peguero - though you might be forgiven for thinking it stood for something else this afternoon. Melvin did, however, acknowledge that Chad Qualls is currently the favorite to start as closer in 2009, replacing free-agent Lyon, who may or may not be back with us.

Doug Davis managed to dodge the loss, despite a wild and ineffective performance that saw him allow seven hits and five walks in only four innings. Things would have been much worse, had it not been for double-plays which ended both the second and third inning. He was pulled after failing to retire the first two batters in the fifth, and it took him 86 pitches to get those twelve outs. Davis ends the season with a 4.32 ERA, slightly up on last year's 4.25. But his 6-8 record extends his streak: ten years in the majors and his W-L record has always been within two games of .500.

If this game is remembered for anything (and it's one I'll be trying earnestly to forget ASAP) it will be for Mark Reynolds becoming the first man ever in the history of baseball - and since 1871, that is more than seventeen thousand players - to strike out two hundred times in a single season. In something of a change of tune, he said afterwards, "It’s obviously something I have to work on for next year,... It’s not the greatest of records to have, but you move on. A lot of young guys struggle." Well, there's struggle and then there's epic struggle. Never mind two hundred, only four players have fanned more than 170 times in their age 24 season:
    Reynolds, 2008: 201 (and counting)
    Adam Dunn, 2004: 195
    Bobby Bonds, 1970: 189
    Jim Presley, 1986: 172

Let's hope Special K's career trajectory follows Dunn or Bonds, rather than Presley, who never had an OPS+ above 87 the rest of his career after that season. However, Reynolds is on course to become the first player to lead the majors in both errors and strikeouts since amusingly-named shortstop Zoilo Versalles (122 strikeouts, 39 errors) did so for the 1965 Minnesota Twins. Versalles ended up being voted the MVP of the league that year; probably not something to which Mark can look forward in the off-season.

[Click to enlarge, in new window]
Master of his domain: Mark Reynolds, +15.0%
God-emperor of suck: Doug Davis, -23.6%
Dishonorable mention: Tony Peña: -13.1%

Appreciate the irony of Mark being the master of his domain, on the same day he became God-emperor of strikeouts. The Gameday Thread was a graphics-filled extravaganza, that showcased some marvelous imagination in terms of posted images. I don't think it's something we want to do again in a hurry [the SB Nation tech-gods would likely kill me!] but as a one-off, it was a great deal of fun. Thanks to all those who took part: shoewizard, Wimb, Azreous, DbacksSkins, kishi, emilylovesthedbacks, 4 Corners Fan, Gravity, TwinnerA, luckycc, Scrbl, snakecharmer, Brendanukkah, Diamondhacks, unnamedDBacksfan, mrssoco, damdrs1717, DodgerBlueBalls, Captain D Bag and soco. Poor Mrs. SnakePit got lost on the way to the thread, but chipped in from afar.

It was, however, an immensely disappointing end to the campaign. Less than four weeks ago, we were 4.5 games up, but have gone 10-15 since that date, and now need to sweep Colorado in order to have a winning season. There are still some things to look forward to - we'll be at our final game on Friday, and I'm pleased to see that Fox Sports AZ will now be showing Webb's final start on Saturday, not previously scheduled. We did stay in the hunt until the 159th game of the season, and that's longer than most teams managed [coughYankeescough]. But if you are anything but disappointed tonight, you're probably a Dodgers fan.

I'll be holding off on the whole recrimination and blame analysis thing until after the formal end of the season on Sunday. I plan to enjoy the last few games free of pressure - there'll plenty of time for everything else during the off-season.

Record: 68-65. Pace: 83-79. Change on last season: -6
Magic number: 27. Playoffs odds: 69.8%

There isn't much I can add to the above, posted in a paroxysm of rage after the game this afternoon. Harsh? Perhaps. But I've had enough of the failings of a relief corps that's a huge part of why Arizona has lost fifteen games where we were leading after six innings. That's tied for most in the majors, with the Cardinals; the Dodgers have only ten; the Cubs, just four and the Rays, three.  Here are the win percentages for the Diamondbacks when leading after each inning, compared to the overall major-league average:

What this shows is a particular struggle holding leads in the sixth through eighth innings, and it's the seventh inning where we fall down most - both compared to the rest of baseball, and to the Diamondbacks performance last year, where we had a win percentage of .890 when leading after six innings, more than a hundred points better. Put another way: in 2007, we won almost nine out of ten games where we finished the sixth ahead; this season, we are barely above three in four. Today was the twenty-second loss of the year for the bullpen, and they've now dropped eight straight decisions since their last victory, forty-one games ago on July 10.

Today, Chad Qualls picked up his major-league leading eighth loss in relief, coming in with a 4-3 lead and allowing two runs on three hits. The problem with such late deficits is, it gives Arizona basically no chance to come back, all the Padres needed to do to swipe this one is send Hoffman in, and he promptly retired the Diamondbacks in order, striking out the side. Game over, and we get swept by the same Padres side we swept back in Phoenix.

The offense basically only showed up in the sixth inning, where we had the majority of our nine hits, and all of our runs. There were RBI for Reynolds, Montero, Young and Johnson - the last-named had two hits in the game, the first time the Big Unit has done that since September 2003. Adam Dunn and Young also had two hits of their own, while Chris Burke reached on a pair of walks. However, we failed to do much in the other eight innings, not helped by Conor Jackson getting picked-off second base with one out in the fourth, and that came round to bite us, despite having a 4-0 lead at the seventh-inning stretch.

On the mound, Johnson was sublime up until that point, but surrendered three runs in the bottom of the seventh, the results of a triple, a single and a homer. Though it's now basically certain he won't reach 300 wins this season, it's hard to combine when the Big Unit gave Arizona his eighth quality start in a row. It says something about the Diamondbacks offense, that Randy's streak is only good enough to net him four victories, as Johnson received better than four runs of support only once in those eight outings, and has averaged just 2.9 per game. Today, it was three runs in seven innings, on five hits and just one walk, with nine strikeouts.

[Click to enlarge, in new window]
Master of his domain: Randy Johnson, +14.2%
God-emperor of suck: Chad Qualls, -51.8%
Dishonorable mention: Stephen Drew, -15.8%

An understandably-frustrated Gameday Thread, brightened for about an inning and half, then returning to the gloom whence it came. Thanks to 'charmer for getting it up there, as I got bogged-down at work: on the whole, however, it might have been better if she hadn't bothered! Present were kishi, DbacksSkins, snakecharmer, 4 Corners Fan, srdmad, Wimb, Azreous, unnamedDBacksfan, TwinnerA, jaydubsped, azwebber17 and Gravity.

At least the Dodgers lost, going down by a single run to the even-more woeful Nationals for the second day in a row. But don't look now: as a result of recent suckage by ourself and Los Angeles, the Rockies have picked up 3.5 games since Saturday, so are now only 5.5 games back. And at time of writing, Colorado are 1-0 up in the sixth against San Francisco, with Lincecum being out-duelled by - of all people! - Livan Hernandez. Welcome to Bizarro World!

An off-day tomorrow, so at least we can't lose. Hopefully the Dodgers will, fulfilling my expectations that they would do as well against Washington, as we did against San Diego. Each of us getting swept....not exactly what I had in mind with that prediction, admittedly. Here's hoping the team can come back to Phoenix and get their mojo rising in time for the weekend.

Record: 47-49. Pace: 79-83. Change on last season: -3

After the first five Dodgers had reached base, and they had scored three runs, with men on second and third with no-one out, it was looking like the night would bring nothing more than some unexpected attention to the unwatched DVD pile. It probably would have been better for all concerned had that actually been the case: instead, four hours later, the result was exactly the same, but only after a great deal of additional effort and tension on the part of all concerned - not least, the 1,000+ comments which were typed into the Gameday Thread.

Early on, it seemed as if our offense was going to blow past the Dodgers. After Chris Young's triple led off the third inning, our hitters had, to that point, gone 9-for-15. However, it was as if someone turned off the offensive faucet when LA starter Kuroda left the game after the second: in nine subsequent innings against the Dodger bullpen, we managed only seven hits and one run. That was the biggest difference between the two teams last night: the Dodgers pen just kept hurling very good arms at us. With the exception of Falkenborg - who faced one hitter - everyone else had an ERA of no worse than 3.32, and that's with closer Saito and his 2.18 ERA on the disabled list. The LA relievers we faced last night had a combined ERA of 2.47 - only Lyon is below three for us.

One factor was the absence of Chad Qualls: we expected to see him in the seventh inning, with the Diamondbacks clinging to a one-run lead. However, while warming up, he felt a twinge in his lower back. Qualls said, "I started getting going in the seventh inning and I thought I was in there. It was a little sore, a little tight and during the pitching change they decided to go with Rosie. I guess they're just more on the safer side." Safer for Qualls, but not for that lead, as the designated replacement, Leo Rosales, retired one batter, then allowed a tying homer and a long, ground-rule double, which hardly counts as stepping up and getting it done, by any means.

That did expose the weakness of our bullpen - its disturbing lack of depth, especially with Qualls unavailable, and Juan Cruz on the disabled list. Once you get past Lyon and Peña [who combined for 2.2 innings, and retired all eight hitters that they faced], things get painfully slim, with the likes of Rosales, Robertson and Doug Slaten, whom Melvin tried to squeeze two innings out of, for the second time in his entire career. Any guesses how that worked out? If your answer was 'game-losing homer,' then you have more accurate, if less optimistic, expectations than Bob Melvin. Kudos, however, to the Petit Unit, forced into an extended outing by the early departure of Doug Davis, and who allowed one hit and one run over three innings.

Davis was horrible. As noted above, the first five Dodgers reached, and it took a niftily-turned double-play by Mark Reynolds, tagging the runner off third, then throwing to first, to avoid us being in a much worse hole than three runs down after the first. He got through the second without problem, and even the opening two batters in the third. However, a walk and a home-run to Nomar brought LA right back into the game, and Davis's night was over one batter later. He will likely not thank me for reminding him of the following line: three innings, five hits, three walks, five runs, four earned.

Fortunately, Kuroda was even worse. After getting Drew to ground out, he also allowed five straight hitters to reach safely - in our case, on five straight singles - and a groundout by Young had given us a first-inning lead that had looked extremely unlikely, only a few minutes before. We added two more runs in the second and another in the third, but that was our lot. Oh, if we'd only been able to take advantage of one of the opportunities to add on more runs; the Diamondbacks were 0-for-8 with runners in scoring position after the second inning. Perhaps the best of these was in the sixth, when we loaded the bases with one out. However, Chad Tracy popped up to the shallow outfield on the first pitch he saw, and Mark Reynolds went down swinging.

All told, however, we can't really blame the offense for dropping this one, not when they got 15 hits [even with the maddeningly-inconsistent strikezone of home-plate umpire, Jim Reynolds, who was not giving the same pitches to both sides]. Conor Jackson had the best night, reaching base safely on five occasions, with three hits and two walks. However, he was also charged with two errors on the same play in the opening inning, first bobbling the ball in left, and then making a poor throw to third which allowed the runner to advance. [This is my fault, having pointed out his errorless streak at LF in my midterm report!] Hudson had three hits and a walk, while Young and Tracy each added a pair of knocks. It just wasn't enough, on a night where Doug Davis was basically no use, and our already-thin bullpen gave up too many long balls, with three homers in eight innings.

[Click to enlarge, in new window]
Master of his domain: Tony Pena, +23.3%
Honorable mention: Jackson, +17.9%; Lyon, +14.3%
God-emperor of suck: Doug Davis, -29.1%
Dishonorable mentions: Rosales, -22.2; Slaten, -18.9%

Definitely a high volume thread: as already noted, we passed 1,000 for the first time in a while, with ten posters delivering forty or more comments. Here's the rollcall for the game: 4 Corners Fan, kishi, soco, DbacksSkins, Scrbl, utahdbacksfan, hotclaws, TwinnerA, mrssoco, DiamondbacksWIn, emilylovesthedbacks, Stile4aly, snakecharmer, AF DBacks Fanatic, unnamedDBacksfan, UofAZGrad and Muu. Thanks to them for their passion: occasionally a little too much passion, and the new SnakePit policy, effective as of last night, is that posts which include profanity will immediately be hidden by the moderators, unless a free-fire zone has been announced by myself. And, believe me, that won't happen often. I don't want to censor free expression - but if you can't think of anything better to type than "F***!", then you're not trying hard enough. [Foreign language cursing - particularly in tongues not understood by the mods - remains fine. :-)]

Worth noting that the All-Star break hasn't cooled off our bats: we have had 12 or more hits for five straight games, and are batting .315 over that span. That's the longest run for us since we went six in a row back at the end of April and into early May during the 1999 season, and only three NL teams have passed five since then [Houston had seven in June 2007, while Atlanta [July 2006] and Cincinnati [April 2000] both managed six]. Unfortunately, we still have a losing record over that span, as our pitching has allowed 29 runs in those five games. Still, little steps - though if we can maintain that streak against Billingsley this evening, I will be really impressed.

Record: 47-48. Pace: 80-82. Change on last season: -2.

So, there you have it: the Diamondbacks have a losing record over the first-half of the season. It really didn't seem likely when we started off the year winning twenty of our first twenty-eight games: at that point, it looked like we were going to run away with the division and clinch a playoff spot by the middle of August. Not quite the case, shall we say. The question of what the hell happened is something that we'll be discussing during the All-Star break. Tomorrow should see my mid-season report on the team, looking at what went well, what didn't, and who should be held accountable. For the moment, however, let's just concentrate on this single loss.

Stop me if you've heard this one before. Another quality start from our pitchers goes unrewarded. Arizona wastes its offensive opportunities, not helped by a fundamental lack of basic skills on the base-paths. And the bullpen fails to keep the team in the game, Chad Qualls getting tagged with the loss. Does any of this sound about as familiar and welcome as a re-occurring nightmare? Indeed, except for a pleasing amount of offense - fourteen hits for the Diamondbacks - this was, to a large extent, the 2008 first-half in miniature.

The lack of runs is what killed us once again. It's only the second time in franchise history we have had so many hits, and come away with so little to show for it. Back on August 1st, 2003, we had fifteen hits in Wrigley Field, and like today, only managed to plate a runner three times. Cole Hamels gave up a career-high eleven hits; we should have buried the Phillies as a result. The seventh inning was particularly painful, as a combination of poor management and bad execution snuffed out a rally, following hits by Webb and Drew to put two men on, with nobody out. The score was 2-1 to Arizona at this point, so here was a real chance to add on to that lead, and go on from there, perhaps to take the game and the series.

However, Bob Melvin's love for the bunt cost us the first out, as our best hitter, Conor Jackson, wasn't allowed to hit: his sacrifice failed to advance the runners, so we still had first and second, now with one out. Hudson then sent the ball to the outfield, where Jenkins couldn't quite corral it. Unsure whether it would be caught, Drew was held at third by Chip Hale - a questionable decision in itself. A thousand times worse, though, was Orlando Hudson steaming around first, not noticing the log-jam on the bases ahead of him, where Jackson had been forced to stop at second, since Drew was holding at third. O-Dawg was caught in a rundown, and another out was gifted to the Phillies. This is at least the third time I can recall this season, where Hudson has shown a running game which would be an embarrassment at the Little League level. At what point is someone going to deal with this?

Overall, frustrating though it was, we can't really blame the offense here. Not when Chris Burke has three hits. Yeah, that matched Burke's total from his previous eighteen games combined. You will understand why that was more of a surprising bonus than anything else. Drew, Hudson and Tracy all had two-hit days as well, with Tracy smashing a home-run off a left-hander. That was his first off a southpaw in more than two years [the last being a grand-slam against Brian Fuentes in Colorado, on July 8th, 2006]. The only factor I can really criticize is one walk for the entire team, against eleven strikeouts, and this would be why it took Hamels less than a hundred pitches to get through his seven innings of work.

Brandon Webb had a solid outing, allowing seven hits and no walks over seven frames, striking out six Phillies hitters. He kept Arizona in the game, and deserved a better fate than a no-decision. Chad Qualls came in for the eighth, and has absolutely nobody to blame for the loss but himself. There were no inherited runners, and he still contrived to allow four runs while retiring one batter - he served up a three-run homer to Burrell and a solo one to Feliz. It's interesting to note that, in a tied game, with the go-ahead run at second and no outs, Burrell was allowed to actively hit. I suspect that, had we been in that situation, Bob Melvin would have activated the flashing neon, "BUNT!" sign, regardless of who was at the plate. This may or may not be connected to the Phillies having a 52-44 record at the break, while we languish below .500.

[Click to enlarge, in new window]
Master of his domain: Brandon Webb, +13.7%
God-emperor of suck: Chad Qualls, -37.6%
Dishonorable mention: Conor Jackson, -11.8%

4 Corners Fan, Zephon, srdmad, njjohn, hotclaws, soco, mrssoco, snakecharmer, DiamondbacksWIn, Scrbl, TwinnerA, kishi, Mr. Philosophical, seton hall snake pit, MamaLing, garyho, unnamedDBacksfan, emilylovesthedbacks, mikeb, Stile4aly, NewJackCity and Azreous were all to be found in the Gameday Thread this afternoon, so thanks to them for their contribution. With the Dodgers looking all but certain to polish off the Marlins [9-1 up in the eighth], it seems that our lead will be one game going into the All-Star break.

It is still a lead. Though it does make the first series back after the break, where we face the Dodgers, one of enormous importance. We have set up our rotation so that we will be sending Davis, Haren and Webb to the mound - I can only imagine that the Dodgers will be doing the same, so that looks like it will be three impressive pitching match-ups. That said, and even if the resulting runs were not as plentiful as we'd hope, I was impressed how we took it to Hamels - the only starter save Haren, with a WHIP below one coming in - and we will need to hit well in the second-half if we are going to stop this slump.

Things should still be pretty active round here though. I will be posting the mid-term report tomorrow morning [I need to wait for some stats to be updated before I can complete it], and I have a few other topics we can throw into the mix for discussion. Tuesday will have the All-Star Game and Random Thread, and I believe Zephon has been working on a minor-league mid-term, which he'll be posting at some point in the next few days as well. So, stay tuned...

Record: 46-46. Pace: 81-81. Change on last season: -3

There are those out there who may mock our beatification [look it up...] of Penelope Cruz, canonizing her as St. Penelope of the Cross. But even the nay-sayers would be hard pushed to discount the miracles that followed immediately the invocation of her name, on not one but two occasions tonight. The first time was to break up the perfect game being thrown by Bergmann in the fourth - he'd retired the first ten Diamondbacks batters in a row. Immediately, the very next hitter, Drew, singled - as did the one after him, Hudson. Still, St. Penelope was only warming up: breaking up no-hitters is what drew her to our cause to begin with.

Even more impressive was her performance in the bottom of the 10th, after Peña had blown our second save opportunity of the night, coughing up three runs, while retiring one batter. The winning run was at third with one out, and the plaintive cry, "Help us, St. Penelope, you're our only hope" rang through the Gameday Thread. And lo, our prayers were heard: Flores grounded out, and Montero survived being plowed into by Kearns at home-plate. Another ground-out followed, and the hopeless cause which is the 2008 Arizona Diamondbacks lived to fight another inning - where Qualls finally managed to hold the third multi-run lead of the night.

Speaking of whom: all previous bad things said about Qualls are officially stricken from the record after his past trio of performances. In two of them, he came in with an inherited runner at third and one out, and that runner did not score [and the third was a 1-2-3 inning]. Mark Grace had an interesting observation, saying that he thinks Qualls is more effective when he takes a bit off his pitches, the increased movement making up for the lower velocity. I can see how that's the case, and Qualls has now retired the last ten batters he has faced, and pitched out of a couple of very sticky situations, not of his making. As an illustration, let's take a look at the Fangraph for this game. And remember, the louder you scream, the faster we go...

[Click to enlarge, in new window...IF YOUR HEART CAN STAND IT!!!]
Master of his domain: Chad Tracy, +44.7%
Honorable mentions: Qualls +42.7%; Haren +31.6%; Drew 26.6%;
Hudson +13.6%; Romero +11.8%
God-emperor of suck: Tony Peña, -78.6%
Dishonorable mention: Lyon -16.5%; Young -16.4%

A picture is worth a thousand words, though most of the words caused by the above were unrepeatable in polite society. I think this fangraph sets new records in a number of areas. Most AZ players at +10% or above: seven [Special K was at 10.1%, but for reasons I'm sure we'll mention shortly, he deserves no "honorable mention"]. Worst performance in a winning cause: Peña, -78.6%. And best performance in a losing cause goes to Austin Kearns of the Nationals, who ended the day at a staggering +77.5%, even as his team was defeated.

How, exactly, did this happen? How did Arizona turn an excellent first eight innings by Dan Haren into...that? Well let's start by asking Bob Melvin, who opted to send Haren out there for the ninth, though he was at 104 pitches, in pursuit of a meaningless complete-game shutout. Even after Haren walked the lead-off man, getting his pitch-count up to 110, his manager opted to leave him out there, and a single promptly followed, putting the tying run on base. Finally, at least one and perhaps two batters too late, Melvin went to Lyon for a save that had, quite unnecessarily, become a great deal more difficult than it would have been.

Exhibit B: Mark Reynolds. Lyon allowed a single to load the bases, still with no-one out, but then got Kearns to hit a grounder to third. Special K, however, backed up and let the ball play him; instead of a nice double-play, it went right past him into left-field, and two runs scored to tie the game. Worse was to follow, as two outs later, he clanked yet another ground-ball, loading the bases and forcing Lyon to get a fifth out in the inning. While fortunately, our closer was up to the task, added to another error in the game, it left Reynolds with three on the day, and a major-league leading eighteen on the season. Do have to wonder whether a Ryan Braun-like move to left-field might be best for all concerned? Oh, hang on... :-( [Stats LLC said that, had Washington not scored, we'd have become the first teams to play each other in five straight shutout games for 28 years]

Reynolds did redeem himself somewhat in the tenth, as our offense girded its loins [Chris Snyder was excused loin-girding, for obvious reasons] and posted a three-spot on four straight hits with two outs. It started in fortunate fashion, Rauch - at 6'11" the tallest pitcher ever in the majors - unable to field a half-swing from Jackson. Tracy and Reynolds followed with RBI doubles, and Montero added a third run to the cushion. That hit rejuvenated our Win Probability to 96%, after it had dropped as low as 18.1% during that troublesome ninth. Surely, Tony Peña would come in and lock down the save in the bottom of the tenth - especially as Reynolds had been removed for the defensive wizardry which is Augie Ojeda.

Er, no. Pestileñce allowed hits to four of the first five hitters he faced, and the lead evaporated entirely - that Win Probability collapsed entirely, going all the way back down to 17%. As noted above, Qualls - with a little help from St. Penelope - turned back the tide, and handed things over to the offense. Ojeda got plunked to lead off the eleventh, was bunted to second, and came home on a double by Drew. After Hudson was walked, Jackson delivered another hit, but Drew was thrown out at home - with only one out, seemed a bit questionable to send the runner from third, rather than keep the bases loaded. However, Tracy added an insurance run to make it 7-5, and Qualls pitched a remarkably stress-free 1-2-3 inning to give us what we should have had all along - a two-run margin of victory.

We might want to play extra innings more often, based on this performance, as our offense clearly loved it - they got seven hits in the tenth and eleventh, which is exactly the same number as the first nine innings combined. Drew, Jackson and Tracy all had three-hit days, while Hudson had two hits and a walk. Particularly pleased to see Tracy getting hot - they're picking the match-ups for him, but in eight July games, he is batting .407 [11-for-27] with six RBI. Chris Young went 0-for-5 and continues to struggle a bit: since June 20 he is now hitting .203 with only five walks, for an OBP of just .257. Yet Melvin continues to bat him lead-off.

Lost in this was another brilliant outing by Haren, who pitched eight innings, allowing three hits, two walks and two runs (one earned) while striking out a season-high nine Nationals. That's his eighth quality start in a row, even if Haren only has been credited with the win in three of those. His ERA over that time is 1.45, with a K:BB ratio of 52:11. If there is a hotter pitcher in the National League over the past month and a half, I'd be surprised, and it would be no shock if his next appearance is starting the All-Star Game for the National League on Tuesday. It'd certainly be well-deserved.

A "somewhat tense" Gameday Thread today, and we surged past 800 as a result - pleased to see some new (or newish!) faces, so a formal welcome to NewJackCity, AF DBacks Fanatic and MamaLing. There was also a good turnout of regulars: Zephon, srdmad, kishi, nihil67, 4 Corners Fan, Muu, Scrbl, TwinnerA, Azreous, Counsellmember, soco, Wimb, mrssoco, Geno Ardi, golfmanthee, ChandlerDad, hotclaws, SongBird, garyho, dstorm and Diamondhacks. The net result is that we did indeed take two out of three in Washington, ugly and lumpy though this last victory was. The Dodgers are still playing - tied 4-4 with Florida in the eighth as I write - but at the very least, we will be tied for first as we head off to Philadelphia for cheesesteaks and the Phanatic, quite possibly the finest mascot in all baseball. If the games are less pulse-pounding than this one, I wouldn't mind too much!

And it almost worked. Unbridled Pessimism day at the Pit nearly pulled off a stunning upset, with the Diamondbacks leading the Red Sox by two runs, with just four outs left to get. But, inevitably, the lead was coughed up by Chad 'Inherited Runners' Qualls and we snatched disaster from the jaws of triumph. If only we had maintained a united front of gloom and doom in the Gameday Thread. But nooooo: someone decided they were "all about positivity." "I'm not going to join in," said the Cheerful Charlie. "Deal with it." It only takes one to spoil the barrel of vinegar, and as a result, I refer you to my post of 5:30 pm:

All together now: told you so.

Let's not be selfish, since there's plenty of blame to go around. Start with our hitters, for failing to capitalize on a host of opportunities during the early frames. After six innings, we had seven hits and four walks - enough to have buried the Red Sox totally. However, all we had to show for it was Tracy's three-run homer and an RBI single, also by Chad. Chris Young grounded into a double-play to end the fifth, and the chances dried up: from that point on, we went 1-for-14, and didn't  get another man into scoring position. Even allowing for our deep disdain for all things positive, a three-run lead just never felt like it was going to be enough, even though Davis was pitching well.

He'd allowed five hits and a walk through the front seven, with the only damage a one-out homer by Pedroia in the first inning. Beyond that, he was great at throwing the Red Sox hitters curves when they were expecting cutters, and vice-versa. From the second through the seventh innings, Boston only had one at-bat with a runner in scoring position. His final line was seven innings, seven hits, one walk, six K's and three earned runs: another very solid outing, another no-decision. It leaves the unfortunate Davis still winless in over a month, even though four of those six appearances have been quality starts.

Way to go, Melvin: leave your starter in too long, bring in the wrong reliever, and then leave him out there until the game is lost. You must get up very early. With Haren publicly saying last night, how he was done after 98 pitches, what made you think Davis was still fresh after 94? And how many times has Davis got any outs in the eighth inning for AZ? Exactly once in 41 starts. Lo, the Red Sox got two hard-hit singles, and the tying run was suddenly at the plate, with the big guns in their order coming up, in the shape of Pedroia, Drew and Ramirez. Time to go to the bullpen, for sure - even if Melvin was late to get anyone warming up there. So who does our manager pluck out of the pen, with men in scoring position? Chad Qualls, who has shown a horrible fondness for botching situations like that this season.

Here are Qualls' splits for the year, coming into today's game:
   Bases empty: .176/.263/.250
   Men on base: .242/.310/.355
   Runners in scoring position: .333/.404/.487
The last figure will now look even worse, as Boston went 3-for-5 tonight there against Qualls - a quick bit of button-pushing reveals opponents are now batting .364 against him with RISP. I know Melvin was aiming for the twin killing, but Qualls has just one double-play since April 24, covering 33 at-bats with someone on first. Give him an empty inning, and he is fine; bring him in with the bases clogged, and this is why Qualls leads the majors in losses by a reliever, with a 1-6 record. You'd think lessons might have been learned after Saturday in Minnesota, where he retired just one of six hitters he faced with men in scoring position.

That's the third defeat in a row where we had the lead, and couldn't hang on to it. Only three outs left, so we didn't have much hope of pulling this out of the fire: especially facing Papelbon, who has a 1.52 ERA post-2005, the lowest in the majors of any pitcher with 100+ innings. A one-out walk by Byrnes gave fractional cause for hope: might he steal second, and put us just a bloop away from tying the game? In a word, no. He almost got picked off once, and after that, he never looked like he was even going to try. Drew fanned, and Hudson grounded harmlessly out, to end the game.

Positives, outside of Doug Davis? Well, the Dodgers lost. Tracy looked good, driving in all four runs with two hits, and also getting a walk. Jackson also reached safely three times, on a hit and two walks, while Hudson chipped in with a couple of hits. But Young continues to free-fall going 0-for-4, and one wonders why Reynolds and Upton were both benched for the night; replacements Ojeda and Salazar were 0-for-7. Beyond that, I can offer nothing better than Dbackskins' fabulous visual aid:

[Click to enlarge, in new windowII]
Master of his domain: Chad Tracy, +34.9%
Honorable mention: Doug Davis, +13.3%
God-emperor of suck: Chad Qualls, -62.7%
Dishonorable mentions: Drew -16.4%, Snyder -11.3%

Another monstrous Gameday Thread, almost necessitating a double-overspill, and ending at 928 posts for the night. Present were 4 Corners Fan, DbacksSkins, Muu, dbacksfan01, Zephon, hotclaws, TwinnerA, soco, dahlian, kishi, luckycc, emilylovesthedbacks, Augie's Army, seton hall snake pit, Counsellmember, likeavirgin, mrssoco, Wimb, Diamondhacks, dstorm, srdmad, unnamedDBacksfan and ChandlerDad. Thanks to them for their presence, and a brave but futile pursuit of Unbridled Pessimism day: I don't think we'll be trying that again in a hurry. Still, we regroup and get ready to come back strong tomorrow, when we will be formally auditioning a new potential saint for the Diamondbacks pantheon. So that'll be nice...

Record: 32-26. Pace: 89-73. Change on last season: -2

Ooh, look at the Diamondbacks queuing up for the all-you-can-eat Blame Buffet this evening. There's Mark Reynolds, piling his plate high. Chad Qualls looks particularly hungry too. Doug 'Batting Practice' Slaten is forming an orderly line, right in front of Augie 'Mini EB' Ojeda. I see Chris Snyder, letting Prince Fielder steal in, right before his eyes. And Bob Melvin is coming back for a second helping, while we try to work out the logic behind his baffling managerial choices. Even Doug Davis is nibbling on an appetizer, since Fielder's theft of third-base was likely as much on his head as Snyder's.

Otherwise, though, up until the seventh inning, Davis was pretty much everything you could want, with just one run on five hits and a walk. Sure, the Brewers had runners in scoring position with no outs in the first and second inning, and two outs in the third, but the only damage after six frames was Fielder's manufactured run: single, wild-pitch, steal, sacrifice fly. I was more than a little surprised - and said so at the time - that he was allowed to bat for himself in the sixth, then go back to the mound for the seventh. With a fully-rested bullpen [only two innings over Saturday and Sunday], it seemed to be pushing our luck somewhat, especially as we only had a two-run lead.

And events proved these fears entirely justified. Another infield single [one of five on the night, which seems like an awful lot], Drew's off-line throw pulling Tracy off the bag, and then a walk, marked the end of Doug's night, but was only a warm-up for the atrocity exhibition to come. Chad Qualls came in, and Kendall tried to sacrifice - Qualls, with plenty of time to get the runner, threw wildly and again pulled the fielder covering first away from the base. That meant everyone was safe, with the bases now loaded with Brewers, and still no-one was out. Worse was to follow: Qualls then coaxed a ground-ball to Reynolds, who fired the ball home. Or, more accurately, fired the ball about five yards to Snyder's right, allowing two runs to score and tying the game.

Remarkably, Qualls then managed to escape the second and third, nobody out jam without further damage, on a strikeout, a walk and a double-play - let's just review the Win Probability as the inning unfolded:

Milwaukee Win Probabilty - 22.3%
B Hall Single - 29.3%
J Hardy    Walk - 39.7%
C Qualls relieved D Davis
J Kendall SacBunt+Err - 53.0%
G Kapler FC+Err - 82.3%
R Weeks Strikeout - 73.5%
M Cameron Walk - 73.5%
R Braun    Ground DP - 50.0%

"Ok, we somehow got out with the score still tied. We just need our bullpen to..." Barely had that thought crossed my mind, when Doug Slaten served up a fatty to a fatty, and Prince Fielder promptly crushed the ball to deep center. It may not have landed yet - the results of that pitching change made the NL Manager of the Year look a bit crap, didn't it? In the ninth, some luck finally broke Arizona's way: back-to-back errors by the Brewers allowed Reynolds and Upton to reach. With the tying run on second, we were back in the game; a sacrifice bunt by Snyder [and, for once, this actually increased our Win Probability, albeit by a massive one-half of one percent] brought the tying run to third with one out. Even a sacrifice fly would do.

But there then followed a pair of mystifying decisions by Melvin. Firstly, letting Burke - about the worst hitter on the roster - hit for himself. Somehow he managed to work a walk, loading the bases for a pinch-hitter. Who do you think Melvin sent up? Miguel Montero? Jeff Salazar? Even, perhaps, the injured Conor Jackson, for some Kirk Gibsonesque heroics? No: try Augie Ojeda, a man who has been in the majors since 2000, has amassed eight sacrifice flies in that time and was getting his first at-bat since May 25. Really: much as I love the littlest ballplayer, he's not who I wanted to see at the plate. I have a better chance of driving the ball to the outfield than Ojeda. He immediately fell behind 0-2, just got a piece of a couple of pitches that were miles outside the zone, then popped up weakly on the infield. Drew got screwed by the umpire for strike three, though the way we played over those final innings, we can hardly complain - we don't deserve to win a game for the rest of the season.

The bullpen picked up its tenth loss of the season, against only three wins, wasting another quality start. The Diamondbacks' rotation has now gone 29-16, the most victories in the majors - even including the AL, where starters go deeper and so have more chance of a decision. In comparison, last year, our relievers didn't pick up their tenth defeat for another entire month, until July 4. It's turning into a real Achilles heel for the team: Qualls and Slaten have combined to go 0-7, in just 43.2 innings of work. I know wins and losses are not the most reliable method of judging performance - especially for relievers - but a 3-10 record would seem to provide credible cause for concern.

The offense sputtered, coughed, and fell back into the trough from whence they came, going 1-for-7 with runners in scoring position. And even that hit resulted in an out: Reynolds singled to the infield, scoring Drew from third - but Chris Young motored around too, trying to score from second and was thrown out at the plate. That run would have been very nice to have later on, shall we say. Reynolds and Snyder has a pair of hits apiece, with Snyder adding his fifth homer of the year. Burke had a hit and two walks, while Drew reached twice, on a hit and a walk - he was caught stealing on a strikeout/thrown-out double play. That's the first time he's been nailed in the majors, after 13 successful attempts.

[Click to enlarge, in new window]
Master of his domain: Chris Snyder, +22.5%
Honorary mention: Mark Reynolds, +21.1% No, I'm calling that null and void
God-emperor of suck: oh, where to start? Deep breath...
Augie Ojeda, -22.4%
Stephen Drew, -23.3%
Doug Slaten, -25.5%

Tonight's fangraph looks like the overnight pulse-rate of a man whose bedroom was visited at 4am by Al Qaeda, 5am by Jenna Jameson, and finally, at 6am by the Grim Reaper. Not one for the ages, shall we say. I did still mostly enjoy the Gameday Thread, so thanks to the contributors: DbacksSkins, Azreous, kishi, dahlian, foulpole, mr.tunes [welcome!], hotclaws, soco, luckycc, DiamondbacksWIn, Wimb, RAMJB, LucaMaz3, njjohn, Zephon, 4 Corners Fan, Goose, TwinnerA, unnamedDBacksfan, mrssoco and shoewizard.

No-one seems to know how long Jackson will be out. He took batting practice today and is scheduled to run some agility drills tomorrow, which will hopefully answer some questions there. The MRI he received on Saturday showed a small tear in his quadriceps, and Melvin said yesterday that "We're going to try to shut him down for potentially three or four days and see where we're at. If he's back in the lineup a couple days after that, it's kind of what we're hoping for." Seems like it might be the middle of the Pittsburgh series before we get him back fulltime, at best. The latter story does say Jackson might be available as a pinch-hitter, and Melvin describes him as "usable, but not my first option." Which makes his absence in the ninth today all the more puzzling.

The Dodgers, to no-one's great surprise, closed the gap to 3.5 by beating the Rockies, who dropped their eighth game in a row. If Colorado keep this up, they are going to end up right alongside the 1998 fire-sale Marlins, for the biggest implosions in baseball history: Florida went from 92 wins and World Series champions, to just 54 the next year; the Rockies have now lost 16 of their last 21 games, and are on pace to go from the World Series to a 56-106 season. More importantly, we can't expect them to take the next two games from Los Angeles, and so winning tomorrow and Wednesday become doubly-important. 

Record: 30-24. Pace: 90-72. Change on last season: -1

That one hurt. In the first two games, we were never really in them, so the defeat was more inevitable than anything too disturbing or shocking. This one, however, was looking pretty good through the seventh inning, as we held on to a one-run lead, and Randy Johnson just missed out on passing Roger Clemens for second-place on the all-time strikeout leaderboard. He tied Clemens by fanning the first hitter of that inning and seemed to get to two strikes on everyone else he faced, but was obviously running out of gas, and couldn't quite get the final one he needed to overtake The 'Roid Rocket. Still, he was looking good for win #289, if we could only get the last six outs.

Then, enter Peña and Jackson, who each deserve about equal blame for the eighth inning fiasco that followed. I don't think I can quite stomach a full recap, so let's just go with the play-by-play:

T. Pena relieved R. Johnson
A. Rowand flied out to center
B. Molina walked
E. Burriss ran for B. Molina
R. Durham safe at first on first baseman C. Jackson's fielding error,
       E. Burriss to second
O. Vizquel grounded out to first, E. Burriss to third, R. Durham to second
J. Bowker hit by pitch
F. Lewis walked, E. Burriss scored, R. Durham to third, J. Bowker to second
C. Qualls relieved T. Pena

Well done, Conor and Tony! You must get up very early. The Giants scored the tying run without actually - oh, I dunno - needing to get a hit or anything like that, on two walks, an error and Jackson booting what seems like his ten-millionth simple groundball of the year. We could still have escape on Vizquel's hard grounder, but a clearly-rattled Jackson opted to go to first for the simple out, rather than trying to turn the inning-ending double-play. One plunking and a bases-loaded walk later, and exit Win #289, muttering something about beating the traffic.

Okay, so we still had a chance to win, right? Right? Hello? Is this thing on? I suspect that no-one really felt too confident of our chances, and when Randy 'Snake Eater' Winn homered to lead off the Giants' ninth, the reaction seemed to be one more of inevitability and disappointment than anything else. Perhaps it was the seed I planted before the game, pointing out our poor record - now 1-15 - when scoring three runs or less. It never really seemed that three runs would be sufficient to hold off the Giants, any more than it was sufficient to hold them off in the first two games of the series.

[Obscure factoid for the day #1: Hitting. It was actually the fourth consecutive game scoring exactly the same total of runs, so at least we're consistent - albeit consistently inadequate. That sets a new franchise record: we've had a number of three-game streaks with the same offensive output, but this was the first such four-peat. The Diamondbacks still have some way to go to match the 2003 Cleveland Indians, who scored exactly four runs in seven consecutive games between July 12 and July 20.]

Justin Upton continues to show signs of life, getting his first multi-hit game in a couple of weeks, whacking his first homer since May 8, and adding an RBI triple. That's seven bases in all, the most he's had all season, and the first time too that he's had more than one extra-base hit in the same game, so there's hope he's getting back onto track. He did strikeout twice though, and is now ahead of Mark Reynolds in that category. Orlando Hudson continued his hot hitting with two more hits; since coming back from his layoff, he's hitting .396 [21-for-53]. However, he also grounded into his team-leading seventh double-play. Jackson and Reynolds each reached safely twice, with a hit and a walk.

The best thing to come out of the game was, without question, Randy Johnson's outing: seven innings, six hits, two walks and two runs, with those nine strikeouts bringing him level with Clemens on the all-time list at 4,672. It's just a shame he didn't quite manage to reach #2 in front of the home fans, but it seems all but certain he'll do so again the Brewers next week. He showed excellent control, and managed a couple of strikeouts that left the Giants' hitters looking particularly incompetent: one even falling over onto home-plate after striking out. In his past three starts, Johnson has pitched 20 innings, allowed three earned runs and has a K:BB ratio of 24:3.

[Obscure factoid for the day #2: Pitching. The loss dropped Chad Qualls to 0-5; that's the worst start to a career for any Arizona pitcher, since Willie Blair lost his first seven decisions back at the beginning of our inaugural season in 1998. Next up for Qualls: the consecutive loss streak for an Arizona reliever is seven, by Greg Swindell in 2001-02, and then for an Arizona pitcher overall, the 0-11 record by Edgar Gonzalez between September 2003 and June 2006. EdGon also holds the record run of futility by an Arizona starter - the above was part of a streak where he had thirteen losses in 14 outings, but he swiped a couple of relief wins during it]

[Click to enlarge, in new window]
Master of his domain: Randy Johnson, +21.1%
Honorable mention: Justin Upton, +16.7%
God-emperor of suck: Tony Peña, -27.4%
Dishonorable mention: Chad Qualls, -14.8%

Another very busy Gameday Thread, with 'Skins posting his second straight double-century, finishing at 206 posts for the night. soco hit three figures too, and also present were, unnamedDBacksfan, dahlian, hotclaws, mrssoco, victor frankenstein, srdmad, dstorm, foulpole, RAMJB, TwinnerA, peeklay, Wimb, UofAZGrad, acidtongue, luckycc and LucaMaz3. The final tally was over eight hundred; it seems clear that the number of comments has little or no correlation to team performance. But we need to await 'Charmer's doctoral thesis on factors affecting Gameday Thread participation for a full analysis. :-)

I'm thinking maybe it's time to update our slogan: perhaps something along the lines of, "Hey, at least the Dodgers lost again too." For they also dropped their fourth in a row; while our wretched performance sees the Diamondbacks firmly entrenched, at 10-16, in their first losing month since 2006, Los Angeles has managed to catch up exactly one-half game on Arizona since May 2nd. Don't look now, but San Francisco are seven back...though that too is only one-half game closer than they were on May 2nd. Indeed, to prove how little has changed, despite our poor performance, here are the full NL West standings then and now:

And with that, to bed. I'm trying to talk Azreous into doing the recap for tomorrow night - because, to be honest, after the past three games, my enthusiasm has been stretched painfully thin. The Nationals should present something of an easier challenge, but all hopes of a winning home-stand now lie, like dust in the wind. I just hope that, when we go to Sunday's game, we are not looking to stave off back-to-back sweeps. That may seem unduly pessimistic, but after this series, it doesn't seem utterly implausible.