Where do our milestones sit at the halfway point in the season?
Introduction
Believe it or not, when the D-Backs conclude their game tomorrow night against the Marlins, it will be their 81st game of the season, thus marking the official halfway point of the year. I feel like I say it every year, but it’s wild every year how quickly a baseball season can pass by – especially one with such emotional highs and lows as this one has featured already. To put it mildly, I don’t think the D-Backs necessarily expected to find themselves just two games over .500 at this point. It certainly puts my preseason prediction of 90 wins in serious jeopardy, particularly given the ludicrous injury news the team has sustained over the past week or so. But there will be plenty of time to ponder some of the larger, overarching questions on the season like what to do with their impending free agents, how they handle prospect promotions (if any), and how they address some of their needs in the offseason. For now, I’d rather turn our attention to the individual. Before the season started, I put together a list of three individual milestones that D-Backs players might reach during the season. Given that we are at the exact halfway point, it seemed only appropriate to check in on those milestones and the likelihood they get reached.
Eugenio Suarez Hits His 300th Home Run
Happily, after Suarez’s miraculous turnaround at the plate last year, there were some concerns (myself included) that he might suffer another slow start to the year. Instead, he’s been the third-most valuable player on the roster, mashing 25 homers in the first 80 games of the season – good enough for fourth in the majors behind Cal Raleigh, Aaron Judge, and Shohei Ohtani. That kind of absurd power puts him on pace to eclipse his own record for most homers in a season by a National League third baseman with 50. I don’t know if he can sustain this kind of pace, particularly as he works his way back from a hand injury from a hit by pitch while in Chicago. But even if he doesn’t, he has been a run-producing machine with an NL-leading 67 RBIs to his name while providing a bevy of joy in the dugout. And given his looming free agency this offseason, he will be a prime trade target for nearly every contending team so we should savor that joy for as long as we can.
Zac Gallen Reaching 1,000 Innings Pitched
The team’s Opening Day starter this year and undisputed team ace for the past three seasons, Gallen has looked like a shell of himself for most of the season. He has struggled with walks, leading the NL with 42 and containing the long ball with 19 allowed. Those two factors have combined to allow Gallen to lead all major leagues with 62 earned runs. It’s difficult to imagine a more difficult walk year for his imminent free agency, but his durability could be attractive to potential suitors this winter. Gallen’s 17 starts this season leads the majors and even with his well-documented struggles, he’s managed to average just under six innings pitched per start. That pace has him within shouting distance of the 185 IP he needed to hit the millenium mark for his career this year. If he continues to take the ball every five days through the second-half and find any way to improve his walk rate, he will have a decent shot at making it to an impressive round number.
Corbin Carroll’s 500th Hit
Carroll and Suarez actually eerily paralleled one another over the past year-plus as both players struggled with their offense last year, resurrected themselves at the plate, and have continued to bash their way through the league so far this year. Unfortunately, they have one more similarity: they both are dealing with hand/wrist injuries due a hit by pitch, although Carroll’s is much more serious with a chipped bone felling the younger player. Adding insult to injury, the Seattle-native had been putting up MVP-caliber numbers prior to being plunked as his OPS ranks seventh in the NL and his 2.7 bWAR has him just outside of the top-10 in the senior circuit. Ironically, that OPS is buoyed less by his on-base percentage but by an impressively inflated slugging percentage. Carroll has already nearly matched his homer total from last year (22) and is closing in on his high-water mark for home runs in his ROY campaign back in 2023. That power-over-average approach has clearly paid dividends for him and the team, but it means that an already difficult stretch goal of 500 career hits is that much more difficult and is further hampered by the fallout from his injury.