Tuesday, July 29, 2014

Game of the Day (7/28/14)

Diamondbacks 2, Reds 1 (15). Arizona's Chase Anderson, making his 12th career start, took on Cincinnati's Homer Bailey, making his 164th.

As you'd expect from the final score, Anderson and Bailey were both marvelous. Anderson allowed a second-inning homer to Devin Mesoraco; later in the inning, Brayan Pena doubled and was thrown out at home on Kristopher Negron's single. Bailey allowed a first-inning hit to Paul Goldschmidt, then nothing else until Mark Trumbo doubled and Miguel Montero singled to tie the game in the fourth.

From that point on, the starters permitted scrap bits of rally - a walk and a double play, a single and a sac bunt, a walk, groundout, single, and double play - but neither allowed the events to coalesce into a run. Anderson was pulled after seven, and Brad Ziegler gave up a Negron single and a sac bunt, then left the runner at second. Aroldis Chapman and Ziegler were both perfect in the ninth, and the game rolled into extras.

The rallies in extra-innings were not as numerous as the relievers, so I'm going to streamline this a bit. Pitching for the Reds in innings 10 through 13 were Jonathan Broxton (perfect inning), Jumbo Diaz (perfect inning, then one-out single in the next), and Sam LeCure (leadoff single, then two strikeouts and an abortive wild-pitch-advancement attempt). For Arizona, it was Evan Marshall (one-out single), Randall Delgado (walk-bunt-IBB, then a perfect inning in his second), and Oliver Perez (leadoff HBP). JJ Hoover took over for the Reds in the top of the fourteenth and allowed a walk, but struck out the other three hitters he faced; Perez yielded a single and nothing else in the bottom of the inning.

The Diamondbacks broke through against Hoover in the fifteenth on a Martin Prado walk, a groundout, and a Nick Ahmed RBI single; Addison Reed then worked around a two-out walk to secure the save.

If you like the extremized version of 2014 baseball, then you really liked this game: 15 innings, 12 total pitchers, 14 total hits, 13 total at bats with runners in scoring position, 30 total strikeouts, and 3 total runs. Personally, this sort of game isn't my particular cup of tea, at least once the starters are gone. But it was lengthy, and not utterly bereft of excitement, and I can see where there'd be a certain amount of appeal.

No comments:

Post a Comment