After the team’s 6th straight rocky first inning, veteran Merrill Kelly did what veteran pitchers are supposed to do! Carroll homered, and JMart shoved! Plus one of the wildest plays in the 7th inning you will ever see!
The Dbacks needed Merrill Kelly to step up tonight and get this team back to .500 after another clunker from the staff ace last night. Things got off to a rocky start for Merrill as he gave up a 2 run single to Cedric Mullins to open the first. Oh no, here we go again was how I was feeling watching the 6th consecutive Dbacks game where the starting pitcher allowed at least 1 run in the first inning. However, Kelly quickly quieted things down and proceeded to retire the next 12 batters he faced. This was exactly what this team needed, especially after the offense was willing to claw back a couple of runs highlighted by Corbin Carroll’s 4th home run of the season.
Eugenio Suarez committed yet another Dbacks fielding error in the 5th inning to end Kelly’s streak of retired hitters at 12, but once again Kelly was able to step up and retire the next 4 batters he faced going into the 7th inning. The 7th inning proved to be one of the most bizarre innings of the early season for the Dbacks as it opened up with a walk and a missed 3rd strike call to Tyler O’Neil by Laz Diaz the first base umpire leading to a walk. With 2 runners on, Torey came out to get his starting pitcher, however on his way out there Diaz proceeded to eject both Merrill Kelly and Torey Lovullo and Torey came absolutely un-hinged in about the most spirited ejection I have seen from Torey. Tough way to end a gem of a game on such a blatant missed call and an ejection. Still, the final line for Kelly was 6 IP 3 H 3 ER 2 BB 4K with one of those runs coming in after Kelly had left.
Following the ejection, the bench coach Jeff Bannister went to Shelby Miller and he proceeded to get a quick out on a lineout to Perdomo for the first out of the 7th. Then the craziness began! On a line drive to Lourdes Gurriel in LF, Gurriel made a great diving catch, but then proceeded to launch the ball over everyone to the backstop and Cedric Mullins tagged and scored. However both of the trail runners failed to tag up and Suarez and Perdomo were all over it appealing with the tag to O’Neil on 3rd base and ending the inning. Very difficult play to describe and im not sure if anything I just wrote mad any sense and no idea how you would score it so I would just encourage everyone to watch it themselves!
The bottom of the 7 inning actually got me fired up a bit because while Carroll opened up the inning with a single, he proceeded to sit on first base for 6 pitches to Perdomo before Perdomo wound up flying out on a deep fly ball to center. And then Carroll did it again on 4 pitches to Randall Grichuk before Grichuk grounded into an inning ending double play because Carroll sat on first base for a staggering 10 pitches. Mind you all of this is happening with a backup catcher, Gary Sanchez, in the game who has struggled throwing runners out. I think the reason this bugged me so much and why I thought it was worthy of brining up in this recap is that had Carroll gotten on first and stole second, Perdomo’s deep fly would’ve been enough for him to tag up and get to third. And once on third, the groundball by Grichuk could’ve certainly scored Carroll adding on a crucial insurance run late in this game. Those are the runs this team manufactures when it is going right by pressing the gas pedal on the bases and making the opposition make plays. And those runs add up. I feel like sometimes this offense can get a little stagnant going station to station waiting on the big fly sometimes. What do you guys think?
In a 4-3 ball game in the 9th inning, Bannister called on the 23 year old Justin Martinez in his first big save opportunity at home after the big contract and J Mart absolutely slammed the door! He struck out Cedric Mullins on yet again another filthy splitter that almost knuckled into the strike zone while Mullins certainly had J Mart’s 102 mph sinker in the back of his mind. Mullins couldn’t even get the bat off of his shoulder. Unreal.
The only other interesting note I had from this game was brought up during the broadcast that Merrill Kelly had switched his mitt from the one he used in Yankee Stadium where he got torched in his last outing. The mitt he switched to today had no holes in the webbing so the ball and the pitch grip is completely concealed. I’m not sure if they were worried Kelly was potentially tipping pitches in New York and so he switched his glove or what was going on. However, just to be safe, maybe stick with the new mitt! Something to monitor potentially.