Almost… There…
So, eleven strictly alternating wins and losses it is. On the plus side, that would indicate a win today. It’d give the team an 8-8 record through a tough stretch of the schedule, every one of those games being against an opponent currently on pace for 94 wins or better. It averages out to sixteen games again a 101-game opponent, with the majority of those being on the road. I would say getting a split there would actually be a really strong performance for the Diamondbacks. To be honest, even 7-9 is not exactly going to be a disaster going through such a wood-chipper of a schedule. Especially considering the team has certainly not played as well as they could have. Room for improvement, to be sure.
Most notably, the Arizona bullpen. It now ranks 28th in the majors, with an ERA of 5.18. That’s ahead only of the Angels and Nats, who both have a bullpen ERA above seven. [And if you want proof of how meaningless wins are for relievers, the LA bullpen has a record of 10-6!] Frankly, the D-backs having a worse bullpen than the Rockies who are… /gestures vaguely in the direction of Denver should be a cause for major concern. To be fair, it’s bloated by the back-end. Joe Mantiply, Kevin Ginkel and Jose Castillo have appeared in 22 games, pitched 21.2 innings and have a combine ERA of 13.71. That’s going to make any bullpen’s stats resemble the Hindenburg.
Take that trio out, and the rest of the D-backs bullpen has a much more respectable ERA of 3.71. Now, you could do the same thing to other teams, and obviously, removing the worst members will help them too. But today’s opponents, the Giants, don’t have ANY relievers with a 2025 ERA even of seven. The Dodgers have had just a dozen innings from bullpen members whose ERA is greater than five (including, I just noticed, D-backs cast-off J.P. Feyereisen). And so on. The back end of the D-backs relief corps has both been a) worse, and b) more heavily used, than most teams. We cannot get Justin Martinez back soon enough.