Diamondbacks 2, Dodgers 8 - And Here We Go

Mar 31, 2023 - 5:23 AM

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Welcome to another season of Diamondbacks baseball. If you were expecting a different result, well, you’re a Diamondback fan and you know the drill. Pump those brakes.

But an 8-2 Opening Day drubbing by the Dodgers? I’m not sure many expected that - especially with Zac Gallen on the mound. After an off-season of pumping up our new acquisitions, the bullpen is still packed with unproven players and the team forgot how to hit.

To most everyone’s surprise, the team started out as well as you could expect against Julio Urias as the team strung together a HBP from Marte and singles by Gurriel Jr and Walker to push the first run of the day across. Veteran presence Evan Longoria wasted the threat, grounding into a double play to end the inning.

The next inning was more of the same ‘small ball’ we saw last year that brought so much joy. Nick Ahmed doubled to lead the inning off, and #productiveouts moved the runner all the way home, with Gabriel Moreno’s fly ball enough to score the run, 2-0 Dbacks.

And that was it for the offense on the day. Seriously. Marte reached on an error and hit a single in the 6th, but tried to advance on Mookie and was thrown out. No walks, just a whole lot of nothing burgers falling easily into Dodger gloves as Urias cruised through 6 innings under 80 pitches. The Dodger bullpen matched the effort, going perfect through the last 3 innings to stymie the offense at 2 runs and 4 hits. Embarrassing.

Gallen started just as hot as the offense, cruising through the first two innings but Mr Outman failed to live up to his name as he walked to start the inning. A ground rule double followed, and it looked like Zac would get out of the jam unscathed, but Will Smith dumped a single to right, tying things up at 2 a piece.

A clean 4th followed, but the 5th was his downfall as he lost command and the Dodgers capitalized, working counts and using some small ball of their own to push across three runs, knocking out Gallen after 4.2 innings. The final run came from traitor David Peralta, who singled home the last of the innings’ runs off reliever Cole Susler before J.D Martinez was thrown out at 3rd.

Cole came out for the next inning but could not find the zone, walking the first batter and allowing an Outman homer to push the lead to 7-2. Other bullpen members included Kyle Nelson and Kevin Ginkel, who were good, and fireballer Carlos Vargas, who was wild in his MLB debut allowing the 8th run to score and give us our final for the game.

Not much to cheer about WPA-wise on the day, Zac Gallen was a -.283 after allowing 5 earned runs in his 4.2 innings and Longoria with a -.1 for an 0 for 3 with a GiDP. Your WPA leader was Christian Walker with a +.063 thanks in part to his RBI single in the 1st to pace the team. Special shoutout to Max Muncy for the Platinum Sombrero (0 for 5 with 5 Ks) in the loss.

300 comments on the night, but no participation trophies in losses so no Comment of the Thread. Keep up the good work! A brisk 2:35 time of day was nice to see, we’ll see if it continues with the game tomorrow, first pitch (hopefully) at 7:10pm.