ERod dominates despite some early defensive miscues and the Dbacks offense continues to pummel Marlins Pitching.
Better late than never! My sincere apologies guys on the late recap. First vacation with the 10 week old and I remembered everything for the baby and the vacation except the recap for you fine folks! The Dbacks swept the 3 game series, their 5th win in a row, against the Marlins in the early morning finale Thursday in what has to be one of the stranger wins of the season. Should you ever feel guilty for winning a game? Maybe a little bit today.
Eduardo Rodriguez was dominant to start this game recording his first 7 outs via the strikeout. Some defensive miscues highlighted by an early Tim Tawa error at second base trying to turn the double play while failing to even secure the out at second base were representative of the early going. ERod settled into a more typical rhythm after the early dominance allowing just 1 earned run over 5.2 innings while striking out 9. Amazingly he allowed 10 hits and only 3 Marlins crossed the plate even with the defensive miscues. Not very often you can say that in Major League Baseball.
Offensively, the Dbacks came just a home run short of their franchise record 10 Home Runs in a 3 game series as Pavin Smith continued his dominance while close to his Jupiter hometown with a HR in the first inning, and Josh Naylor homered in his 3rd consecutive game. Both Smith and Naylor were absolutely instrumental to the offensive performance in this series. The Dbacks also brought flashes of their trademark ‘chaos ball’ to this game as they stole as many bases in this contest as hits as a team taking advantage of the slow move to home from the Marlins starter Edward Cabrera and the backup catcher Rob Brantley.
The Dbacks head to Chicago in hopes of securing the ever-so-crucial tiebreaker advantage. This potentially feels like one of those early series that could have playoff ramifications much like last season if things come down to the wire. Corbin Burnes will look to continue all the momentum this rotation has gained as this was the 8th consecutive game a Dbacks starter allowed fewer than 3 ER.
For all those heart wrenching loses at the end of the season that we stew on over the offseason, we need to remember games like this in which we are out hit 13 to 5 commit 2 errors and still come away with a victory.