On a night in which the Padres lost and the Dbacks had a chance to make up a game in the wildcard standings, this team lost in an all too familiar way.
Todays game was a harsh reminder that this current roster is clearly not a playoff team. Despite the recent surge from Suarez and the offense, this team simply does not have the pieces or the depth to be a playoff team.
On a night where the Dbacks desperately needed a great outing from their starting pitcher, Eduardo Rodriguez clearly rose to the occasion holding the Astros lineup scoreless for over 6 IP. ERod’s velocity was up early tonight hitting 96 mph in the first inning and he seemed to be pitching with an edge tonight given the importance of tonight’s game. To ERod’s credit, he did exactly what this team needed him to do tonight and dueled toe to toe with one of the top starting pitchers in the AL and came out on top.
The Dbacks offense had a tough assignment facing Framber Valdez, however the offense was only able to manufacture 1 run despite having 10 hits leaving 8 runners on base. Once again they looked like a team that is all too reliant on the long ball to score runs vs solid situational hitting. Very unfortunate the offense does this on a night where ERod was so good.
The all too familiar nail in the coffin tonight for the Dbacks tonight was this teams bullpen. Another great outing by a Dbacks starting pitcher wasted as Torey Lovullo was forced to go to Jake Woodford with the season on the line in the 8th inning and a 1 run lead. As to be expected, Woodford walked a guy hitting .209 to bring the go ahead run to the plate and the Astros immediately hit a 2 run home run off Woodford to take the lead and what would ultimately be the game. The pitch Woodford threw was a sweeper that didn’t sweep in the middle of the plate.
In the bottom of the 9th with runners on first and second with no one out, Geraldo Perdomo lived up to his reputation as the RISP king and hit a ball into shallow centerfield. Despite the Astros defense conceding the run and throwing to third base, rookie third base coach Shaun Larkin held Naylor at 3rd base inexplicably. You could see Larkin on the replay initially giving the stop sign to Naylor and then trying to change it to go but Naylor had already slowed down. An inexplicable gaff for a 3rd base coach to make with the season on the line and you could’ve had your fastest runner on 3rd base with 1 out in the 9th down 1 where a passed ball could tie the game. I can personally think of many examples of Shaun Larkin baserunning gaffs this year costing this team.
For me the story of the game was when the game was on the line tonight in the 8th inning on defense and in the 9th inning with RISP, the Dbacks were forced to rely on Jake Woodford and Jose Herrera respectively. You cant convince anyone that you are seriously going for it when those are the only options you are giving your manager as neither player has no business even being on a major league roster. Yes the Dbacks offense fell short with as many opportunities as they had, but you cant put your season on the backs of those 2 players and seriously expect to succeed.
On a night where the Padres lost and this team had a chance to make up a game in the wild card standings, this team let this game slip away in all too familiar fashion despite ERod throwing an absolute gem. Tonight may have just sealed this teams fate as sellers.