Phoenix.BloggersPub

Tim Redding RHP, 6-3, 3.59

Micah Owings RHP, 6-2, 3.73

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Any chance of a win here? Really, that’s all I got. From being a team that had difficulty beating good opponents, we are now a team that has difficulty beating anyone: we have won two series this month, against the Tigers and Rockies. Over the last ten games, we’re tied with Colorado for the worst record in the National League. It’s definitely the offense that has been the issue. During the current 2-8 streak, we’re hitting .217, but the pitching staff has a credible ERA of 4.22 [basically identical to the NL average for the year, which is 4.21].

At least we should be able to hit up and down the order tonight, thanks to the presence of Pwnings in the line-up. Though May has been no kinder to him than a number of our other hitters: he is 2-for-16 with eight strikeouts and no RBIs this month - so Brandon Webb has still driven in more runs this season! It’d be nice to see him get back on track with the bat as well as the ball. Over the past four games, he’s given us a quality start every time, throwing 26 innings with an ERA of 2.77 and a K:BB ratio of 25:8. Hopefully, he can keep us in the game, and the hitters can not stop scoring when they reach three runs. Remember: 22-3 when we score five or more.

his one was inspired by emilylovesthedbacks, who was at last night’s little disaster, but said, “There have been worse games than this one.” Hence, while we wallow in the depths of a four-game losing streak, let’s look back and see how much worse things could be. Let’s dig open the wounds of some old catastrophes. Here are my personal Worst 5 ever, whether personally attended or watched on TV. Oddly, despite things like the 14-game losing streak [which included one where we scored more than three runs], none of them come from the worst season ever, in 2004…

#5. Diamondbacks 10, Marlins 7: August 8, 2007. Despite his issues in the 2001 World Series (more on which later), we love Byung-Hyun Kim. So, we were stoked for the prodigal’s return to Arizona, and brushed off our long-dormant “#49 Kim” jerseys, ready for his debut. It didn’t last long: he allowed more base-runners than he got outs, and was unceremoniously pulled in the middle of the third. Meanwhile, we slunk lower and lower in our seats, trying to hide the name on the back of our shirts. Even a D-backs win couldn’t save this one.

#4. Diamondbacks 3, Mets 13: August 25, 2000. We attended this game at Shea, somewhat nervously as D-backs fans. Just to soothe the natives, I wore an AZ jersey, and Chris [a native New Yorker and former Mets fan] a home one. We needn’t have worried. The Mets had a 6-0 lead by the end of the third, having bounced the Big Unit by that point. So, instead of any aggro, all we had to endure was sympathetic sniggers as the home team kicked our asses from here to the Hudson river and back again. .

#3. Diamondbacks 2, Cubs 6: August 24, 2007. Due to a scheduling quirk, I had tickets to all three games in the series, but after this first one, I serious contemplated burning them. Losing to the Cubs is bad. Losing to the Cubs at Chase, while sitting alongside all the drunken visiting fans, invisible for 362 days of the year, but who crawl out from under the desert rocks whenever the Cubs are in town… However, there was a happy ending, as we beat them the next two games!

#2. Diamondbacks 1, Dodgers 19: September 2, 2002. The infamous Mark Grace pitching appearance was a perfect exclamation point to the worst loss in franchise history. People probably remember that more than the game itself, and it’s for the best: Eddie Oropesa allowed ten earned runs in 1.2 innings, a number not seen since in the majors, and only surpassed by a reliever twice in the past fifty years. I think this was the game where I realized we would not be World Series champions again that year. And speaking of which…

#1. Diamondbacks 3, Yankees 4: October 31, 2001. The second of the infamous late losses to the Evil Empire in that season’s Fall Classic. Halloween was a very appropriate date for this horrorshow. After the failure of the night before, even though he fanned the side in the eighth, seeing Kim come in for the ninth with a two-run lead caused iron butterflies. And we all know what happened: of course, the end result a few days later was perfectly wonderful, but I have never been made physically nauseous by a sports event, before or since.