After being interchangeable most of the year, the Arizona Diamondbacks have taken a sizeable lead over the Colorado Rockies for the top Wild Card spot. We may be getting four previews of the Wild Card game this week with the D-Backs hosting Colorado through Thursday in the final meeting between these two teams before—potentially—October.
This series will be contested from Monday, September 11, 2017 through Thursday, September 14, 2017 at Chase Field in Phoenix.
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Pitching Matchups
The Rockies start the series with their best against the Diamondbacks’ best as Kyle Freeland faces Zack Greinke.
Experience is clearly in Greinke’s corner in this matchup. The righty is 16-6, topping the league in wins, and has a 3.01 ERA after he went seven great innings against the Dodgers in his last start.
In Greinke’s last start against the Rockies at home, he went seven-innings, allowing two runs on three hits in that game.
More recently, the veteran has five quality starts in his last six outings and has allowed only four runs in his last 19.2 innings of work. He’s allowed 15 hits in three walks in that time while striking out 16.
As for the Rockies’ rookie southpaw, he’s been a huge part of the Rockies’ surprising success. His 11 wins and 3.99 ERA lead the team. He’s also thrown more innings at 146.2 than anyone else. Those innings may be catching up to him. The lefty hasn’t been good in his last five starts. He’s 0-3 in those games with a 5.40 ERA.
Further adding to the D-Back’s advantage on Monday, Freeland has surprising home/road splits for a starter in Coors Field. He’s pitched better in Colorado with a 3.67 ERA compared to a 4.39 road ERA.
As the series progresses to Tuesday, the matchup features a pair of right-handers with similarly limited experience. Jon Gray starts for the Rockies and Taijuan Walker is slated to start for Arizona.
Gray is coming off a great start where he allowed one run in six innings against the Dodgers, out dueling Clayton Kershaw. Gray missed much of the year due to injury. Perhaps that’s why he’s pitching so well right now: he’s fresh. Gray has a 2.43 ERA in his last five starts
Walker is also throwing very well right now. He’s won three straight starts after toppling the Dodgers last week. Walker’s ERA is down to 3.33 and while he’s still walking several batters, he’s limited the strong contact and thus keep the opponent batting average down.
Following Walker to the mound in this series will be Patrick Corbin. The lefty had worked himself into a potential postseason rotation with his 2.52 August ERA, but much of that work came unraveled Friday when he gave up eight runs without making it out of the fifth against the Padres. Corbin’s 4.16 ERA is the worst of the five starters making at least 20 starts for the D-Backs.
Interestingly, despite Corbin’s high ERA for Arizona standards, it’s better than his Colorado counterpart for Wednesday. German Marquez is 10-6 with a 4.27 ERA.
Marquez has been the opposite of Freeland. He’s pitched better on the road, but he had a bad road start his last time out.
This series finally wraps up on Thursday with a matchup of two great stories: Chad Bettis and Zack Godley.
For Bettis, the story is about overcoming health issues as he’s back from testicular cancer and just got his first win, beating the Dodgers on Saturday. He did give up four runs, but still got the win.
Godley’s season has had more success on the field. He is only in the rotation because of Shelby Miller’s injury. With a 3.18 ERA in 136 innings, Godley is about as under rated of a starter as there is in the NL.
Who's Hot?
Carlos Gonzalez’s bat is finally coming alive for the Rockies. The talented outfielder is starting to rebuild his value heading into free agency. He’s 12-for-25 in his last eight games with two homers, seven doubles and seven RBIs. That leads to a 1.606 OPS in the very limited sample size. In his last 25 games, CarGo has a .351/.452/.610 slash line.
Nolan Arenado and Charlie Blackmon continue to swing well. Trevor Story is seeing the ball well right now, too. He’s always going to prone to the strikeout, but he’s got six homers and a dozen doubles in his last 28 games.
Right now, the Rockies offense is really clicking and that’s what’s keeping the team in the running with a struggling bullpen and tiring rotation.
While the Rockies’ bats are swinging well, the Diamondbacks’ bats are hot, too.
J.D. Martinez continues to rake in a Diamondback’s uniform. He’s 15-for-36 in September with eight homers and 16 RBIs in eight games. He’s batting .297 with 14 homers and 28 RBIs in his last 26 games.
Paul Goldschmidt is consistently good and consistently hot, making him a prime contender for the NL MVP.
Others hitting well in the last week include Daniel Descalso who is 6-for-19 in his last seven games with a couple homers.
Given how well Archie Bradley has thrown all season long, he’s been hot since the start. He’s allowed only 1 run in his last 14 outings. His 1.25 ERA and 65 innings could qualify him as the team’s most valuable pitcher despite the greater number of innings for Greinke, Robbie Ray and the rest.
Who's Not?
There are not too many cold players for the Rockies, at least not on offense. Gerardo Parra has slowed down. Ian Desmond has never gotten going and Jonathan Lucroy hasn’t had the expected impact. That’s about all the negative.
Turning to the bullpen and we see a bit more struggles. Greg Holland has allowed nine runs and four homers in his last 11 games. Adam Ottavino and Mike Dunn haven’t been great relief either. Pat Neshek and Jake McGee are throwing reasonably well, but the team needs more.
For the D-Backs, it’s hard to find struggles. T.J. McFarland and Andrew Chafin are two that quality. Some of the extra arms in the pen haven’t been as strong as they were early on.
At the plate, A.J. Pollock is batting .181 in the team’s last 30 games. He’s just 5-for-31 in September. Jake Lamb is 7-for-33 in September and has 10 strikeouts in nine games and only a single extra-base hit.
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