Jim's Blog

Despite Arizona having the best record in the National League over the regular season, eight out of ten ESPN "experts" picked the Chicago Cubs to beat the Diamondbacks in the NL Division Series. Well, wouldn't you know it: eight out of ten experts were emphatically wrong, as Arizona swept Chicago out of the playoffs, winning three straight, [...]

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The Arizona Diamondbacks are, as you no doubt know, the 2007 National League West champions. Things looked more than a little dicey after dropping the first two games to the lowly Pirates, but they recovered to win the finale, and a victory on Friday, coupled with a Mets loss, guaranteed our desert rats October baseball. A Padres loss on Saturday [...]

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Arizona is now closing in on their first playoff spot since 2002, leading the division as we enter the last week. It's not over yet - not with three games against the surging Rockies still to come - but things are looking pretty good for the desert boys. They went 4-2 against their divisional rivals in the past week, taking [...]

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Down to the last two weeks in the season, and it looks like nothing will be decided until the last few days. Arizona went on the road against their divisional rivals, and got the hoped-for 3-3 split, taking two from three in San Francisco, but only avoiding the sweep against LA with a win on Sunday. Their nearest rivals, the [...]

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This team continues to amaze. They looked down and out after dropping the first game of the Padres series last Monday, to drop out of the NL West lead for the first time since July. Facing the two pitchers with the lowest ERAs in the league, things looked tough. But Arizona beat both Chris Young and Jake Peavy, then rolled [...]

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(AP Photo/Paul Connors) As we enter the final month of the season, Arizona is still very much in the playoff picture. That comes, even after a disappointing week which saw them lose both series in the week, dropping three of four in San Diego against their biggest rivals, and then [...]

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Arizona came home and split a six-game home stand, winning three and losing three, despite being outscored 17-29 over that time. So, business as usual, really. The Brewers are one of the few NL teams to have a winning record against AZ, and took the first two games of the series. However, Brandon Webb salvaged a win in the finale, [...]

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And the wins just keep on coming. Arizona headed out on the road, to face NL East rivals Atlanta and Florida, and took both series, taking four games of six, an excellent trip for the team. Of course, in typical Diamondbacks style, despite winning both series, they only scored one run more than the opposition. However, it's the victories that [...]

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(AP Photo/Wilfredo Lee) Seven games since last time, and the Diamondbacks continue to roll, winning five of them, and shutting out the opposition in two. The team currently possess the best record in the National League: if the post-season began today, they'd have home advantage and face the Brewers. Of course, it remains [...]

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(AP Photo/Mark J. Terrill) Since last report, Arizona was outscored by the opposition more than two-to-one - a total of 30-14 - but still managed to post a winning record, taking three of the five games. Take that, run differential! Their streak of victories came to a nasty halt [...]

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(AP Photo/Rick Scuteri) Well, that went about as well as could be expected, didn't it? Last week, the Diamondbacks had struggled their way through Milwaukee, and had split the first two games in Wrigley Field. If you'd come up to me and offered a bet that [...]

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After a brisk start following the All-Star break, the Diamondbacks proceeded to blow chunks once more, failing to complete the sweep, then losing three of four in Milwaukee, and finally splitting the first two games at Wrigley Field. No doubting the reasons why, as they team scored just sixteen runs in total, during the [...]

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A change is as good as a rest, they say. The D-backs had both over the All-Star break - even two of the three players they sent to San Francisco for the game didn't see any action. And the team also fired hitting coach Kevin Seitzter, who was nominated as the cause of the club's hitting failures, which have been [...]

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Well, that sucked. Since I last wrote, the Diamondbacks have played three of the weakest teams in the National League, and lost all but one of the seven games. No question why. They've scored only eighteen times in those seven games combined - that's 2.57 per game, if you're counting - conceded 45 runs, and are batting .212 as a [...]

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Okay, so my trip to New York fell through, but I figured you probably deserved a week off from me! Eleven games played by Arizona since last report, with the team going 6-5, and briefly (two days) enjoying their first stint owning top spot in the division since April. They lost the first game of both interleague series against Baltimore [...]

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Happy Father's Day to one and all. This week's report is a little late: that's not because I'm lazy. Well, not entirely - there won't be one next weekend, since we're going to New York, so the next one will be in two weeks. Thus, it made sense to delay this one as long as possible and include the extra [...]

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In five games since last Saturday, the Diamondbacks have gone 3-2; they took the finale in New York, and won the first two games back in Phoenix, both times beating the San Francisco Giants by a single run. However, the one-run game turned round and bit them, as they blew a ninth-inning lead and went on to lose in eleven. [...]

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Back to normal schedule, though because the Diamondbacks are on the East Coast, and playing a morning (AZ time) today, I'll toss in Saturday's game as a bonus extra. Arizona went on the road, facing the Phillies in Philadelphia, and swept them, leading for 26 out of the 27 innings in the series. They then went to New York and [...]

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Slightly late update this week, since I was in California for a couple of days. I'll cover this weekend's games too, so that'll make my next update a good bit shorter! In the nine games played since I last wrote, the Diamondbacks were an impressive 7-2: they took two games from Pittsburgh and, though dropping the series to Colorado in [...]

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The Diamondbacks continued to struggle offensively; they ran their streak of games where they scored four runs or less to fifteen, tying the franchise record, before breaking out on Friday night and scoring a whole...five. The basic theme was thus the same as the previous week, with the Diamondbacks living or dying on the performance of their starting pitching. They [...]

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Despite an off-day Thursday, the Diamondbacks managed a winning week for the first time in a month, taking four of their six games, despite scoring only a total of 18 runs. They were helped by continued strong performances from their rotation, with only one pitcher failing to deliver a quality start. The week ended with the Diamondbacks in second place, [...]

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The Diamondbacks continued their streakiness in the past week. While they were 3-4 in the week once again, they started by running their win streak to six with a trifecta of victories, but then slumped to drop the final four, losing two games each on the road in Los Angeles, and then coming back to Phoenix to drop the first [...]

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The Diamondbacks had an even record at 3-3, but this was seriously a week of two halves. A miserable losing streak developed early on, as the team dropped five games, scoring only fourteen runs in total. And a sixth looked about to happen, as Trevor Hoffman had two outs in the ninth and a 2-1 lead on Wednesday. But a [...]

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