The Diamondbacks keep finding the same painful groove.
For the fourth straight game, Arizona managed just one run, and for the fourth straight game it went hitless with runners in scoring position. That’s now the club’s longest such drought this season, breaking a tie with two other three-game stretches. On top of that, the D-backs struck out 13 times, smashing their previous season high of eight in a game, even while drawing seven walks to set a new season best in that category.
The problem was that the plate appearances never really felt threatening. Houston starter Cristian Javier had them playing from behind almost immediately, and Arizona never truly recovered.
The walks were there, but not because the lineup was grinding out long, uncomfortable at-bats. More often, the D-backs simply weren’t chasing the pitches well off the plate.
Gabriel Moreno wound up with the loudest offensive line of the night, thanks to two walks and a homer. But his evening had plenty of swings in both directions. He missed on a throw home from Max Kepler that could have kept Houston’s third run off the board, and later capped things with a rough TOOTBLAN that summed up the night as well as anything.
Arizona’s pitching did its part for the most part. Merrill Kelly had one troublesome inning, but outside of Houston’s three-run third, he kept the Astros from reaching second base.
The bullpen was solid as well, and Justin Martinez looked overpowering aside from a costly ABS challenge. Martinez was averaging more than 102 mph on his sinker and four-seamer.
Kelly, meanwhile, turned in his second straight strong start, which matters if this is the version Arizona can keep getting as the season moves along.
The first inning opened with a clean play from Geraldo Perdomo, who handled a chopper at short and fired to first for the out. Ketel Marte’s first action at second base since returning from the Restricted & Injured Lists was a little less crisp, though it still worked out when Tim Tawa finished the play at first.
Perdomo also helped create one of Arizona’s few early sparks. After drawing a two-out walk in the third, he stole second, getting the bag despite a throw that sailed well short and forced the fielder to come up for the ball.
Houston did its damage in that same third inning. Yainer Diaz opened the scoring with a homer on a hanging slider that sat right in the middle of the zone and got launched into the Crawford Boxes at 100 mph exit velocity.
Isaac Paredes followed with an RBI double that landed just inside the left field foul pole, and the hard contact kept coming. Jose Altuve was eventually credited with a sacrifice fly, but it nearly ended as an inning-ending double play.
Max Kepler made a running shoestring catch near the left-field line and threw home, where Moreno missed the ball and allowed Yordan Alvarez to score for a 3-0 lead.
Moreno answered in the fourth with a leadoff homer of his own, hammering a high cutter into the Crawford Boxes for Arizona’s only run. His blast came in at 105.1 mph, the hardest-hit ball in the game at that point.
The D-backs had another chance to make something happen in the sixth when Marte dropped a high popup into shallow left for a ground-rule double after the ball bounced into the stands along the line. It was about as fortunate a double as he’ll get this year, but Arizona couldn’t turn it into anything bigger.
There were also a couple of challenge oddities along the way. The Astros catcher missed on both of his challenges, while Martinez lost one in the seventh when the ruling confirmed the pitch was more than three inches off the plate inside.
Arizona’s younger players have generally been hesitant to challenge, but Waldy bucked that trend by challenging a called strike three that was actually off the outside corner. It only changed the scorebook from a ꓘ to a K, though, because he struck out swinging on the next pitch anyway.
Arizona’s worst moment came in the eighth. Moreno drew a leadoff walk and moved to second on a wild pitch, giving the Diamondbacks a runner in scoring position again.
Then came the TOOTBLAN. Marte hit a grounder up the middle, Moreno froze, then tried to scramble back toward second.
Houston’s shortstop charged in, tagged Moreno, and finished the double play at first. It was a brutal ending to another night where Arizona had chances, but not the execution to cash them in.
The Diamondbacks and Astros meet again tomorrow at 4:15pm on FOX. Brandon Pfaadt, 7-2 with a 3.49 ERA, will start for Arizona, while Houston will send out right-hander Ethan Pecko, who is 1-0 with a 6.23 ERA.
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