A for Effort

 

There's a lot of playoff spots still up for grabs as I write this, and by that I mean just one in each league and a lot of seeds bobbing around. You can still see playoff cases for the Mets, Reds, Guardians, and even the Astros if you squint a little. Really, the only elimination we might see in Game 161 might be the Arizona Diamondbacks, which, at the very least came one game earlier than it did last year.

I will applaud the D-Backs for making it a lot more exciting than it could have been this year. By the end of July this team looked pretty dead, lying around 4th in an already-competitive division, pawning away Josh Naylor, Eugenio Suarez and Merrill Kelly, and backtracking from even a still-commendable 2024. Carroll, Perdomo and Ryne Nelson continue to be valid answers for this team, but the infrastructure that made them a World Series team in 2023 with 2 and a half valid starters seems to have fallen off. The players that seemed so close to getting it before, like Jake McCarthy, Alek Thomas, Brandon Pfaadt and honestly Lourdes Gurriel, have backslid into mediocre, weighty pieces. Even someone like Gabriel Moreno, who is a great fit at catcher, is gone for like half the year and they have to start guys like Jose Herrera and James McCann.

And yet for the last two months, especially September, they were right there in the Wild Card race, complicating things for the Reds and Mets. They were never lapping anyone, but they were embedding themselves right in the action, just enough to get people nervous. During this period, Corbin Carroll attained a 30-30 season, Geraldo Perdomo obtained the top WAR in the NL and the possibility of MVP votes, Ketel Marte rode a last swell into a 25+ homer year after a devastating run in his personal life, Zac Gallen reached 13 wins and somehow second-year infielder Blaze Alexander became one of the most crucial contact pieces on the team. How the D-Backs couldn't put something like this together throughout the season but came through with it late is beyond me.

I think it points to the fact that the team is shedding a lot of the pieces that made them competitive in 2023 in an attempt to strengthen, and get younger, for future runs. Obviously Carroll, Perdomo, Moreno and Pfaadt will be big pieces of this team's future, and will remain as the numerous rookie guys get brought up [Druw Jones may be on the way]. In terms of the middle pieces like Alexander, Ryne Nelson, Tim Tawa and Jordan Lawlar, it remains to be seen whether or not they're long term pieces or just guys that tided the team over during a down year. Lawlar's yet to really excel in the bigs, either it's coming next year or it's not coming.

The point is, the Dodgers, Padres and Giants will no doubt be competitive next year, and the D-Backs, even with the possibility of Corbin Burnes returning, still are expected to be a fourth place team. If they can build their way past that, they'll be in business, but this year points to this being a slower process than expected. Which amounts for occasional pops in excitement, but they're gonna need to be more than pops if they want to follow up on the promises they made in 2023. 

Coming Tomorrow- The White Sox didn't know what to do with him in the infield, but thankfully the Red Sox sure did.