Ryan Waldschmidt’s second walk-off homer of August didn’t just end a game. It stamped his name all over the 2026 Arizona Diamondbacks season in a way few players ever manage.
The rookie delivered the biggest hit of the year for Arizona, blasting a pinch-hit, two-run homer off Jacob Webb to beat the Cubs after the D-backs had been down to their final out. It was the kind of swing that turns a night from bleak to electric in one pitch, and it came with the crowd already on edge after Arizona had clawed back from a 4-0 deficit.
Waldschmidt said the moment hit exactly the way you’d expect.
“I mean, anytime you can come up in that spot and win the game for the team is just a special moment, and I think obviously coming off the bench too for a pinch hit makes it even cooler. I know how tough it is to be a pinch hitter.
So to be able to execute like that and in your one at-bat of the game is pretty awesome, and obviously seeing the guys how excited they were and all the fans are cheering. It was just really cool.”
He added later:
“When I go up there and I’m looking up at the scoreboard and seeing it’s the bottom of the ninth inning, two outs, down by one, guy on base and get my name called to go pinch hit, I was grateful for the opportunity. So, I’m walking up, smile on my face, like this is what everyone dreams to do, every kid, every time you’ve played baseball growing up, you make this scenario up in your head.
So for me to go up there and be able to do this in real life and have that opportunity, it doesn’t even matter anymore if you get a hit or not. This is just one of the coolest opportunities that you could ever get.”
The numbers behind the swing are just as loud as the reaction. Statcast measured the ball at a 31-degree launch angle and 102.6 miles per hour off the bat, with an estimated distance of 408 feet. By Win Probability, it was worth +85.5%, making it not only the biggest hit of the season for the Diamondbacks, but also one of the top five in franchise history and the biggest in more than 14 years.
Arizona’s rally had already started to build in the eighth. Gabriel Moreno turned a checked-swing roller with an xBA of .080 into an RBI double, and Geraldo Perdomo followed with a single to cut the deficit to one.
Then in the ninth, Tim Tawa worked a one-out walk, Jose Fernandez ran for him, and with two outs Waldschmidt came off the bench for Jorge Barrosa. Fernandez stole second, the call stood after a Cubs manager’s review, and two pitches later Waldschmidt changed everything.
It also gave him a place in some unusual company. He became the first rookie in Diamondbacks franchise history to hit a pinch-hit, walk-off home run.
Even more striking, he had more walk-off homers, two, than regular home runs, one, at that point in his career. He’s one of only five players to hit two walk-off homers among their first three home runs, and one of the others is teammate James McCann.
The Cubs game was only part of the case for Waldschmidt, though. He had already done this once before in August, and that’s what makes the month stand out.
The only other Diamondback with two walk-off home runs in the same calendar month was Chris Young, who did it on June 5 and June 19, 2007. Ketel Marte also had a pair of more adjacent walk-offs earlier in 2026, on May 19 and June 4, but those were sixteen days apart.
Waldschmidt’s came eighteen days apart.
That’s a remarkable run for a player who had been sent down to Reno in mid-June after pitchers started attacking him with breaking balls. Hitting coach Joe Mather said, “The league made a little adjustment, started spinning a lot of pitches, making it tougher for him at a level of which he’s never seen… The slider started coming out more, we noticed that.” Waldschmidt returned four weeks later after an injury to Lawlar opened a spot in the outfield, and he finished the year as a solid contributor with a .710 OPS.
Still, nothing matched the two August walk-offs. The one against the Dodgers came with two strikes, while the Cubs blast came with one.
The Dodgers homer came off Edwin Diaz, who had an ERA of 11.00 across ten appearances, while the Cubs winner came against Webb, whose ERA after facing Waldschmidt was 2.91. And unlike the Dodgers game, Arizona was down to its final out against Chicago, which only sharpened the drama.
By the end of it, the result was clear: Waldschmidt’s swing against the Cubs was the 2026 SnakePit Play of the Year.
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