Well, here we are again. It’s Kentucky Derby Day, but for some mysterious reason they decided that that race isn’t going to start until 6:57pm Eastern Time, and we were in Chicago playing another early game because apparently it is simply too cold to play baseball on the western shore of Lake Michigan once the sun starts to creep down toward the horizon. After a run of deeply disappointing games against NL Central opponents this week, we had a chance to finally turn things around. We just had to beat
Shota Imanaga, the Cubs’ best starting pitcher so far this year (2.88 ERA), and we needed Ryne Nelson (7.71 ERA) to help us pull it off. No problem, right?
In keeping with last year, I figured that, assuming the teams gave me anything to work with, I could at least do a second annual horse-race coverage recap. I’m not sure the teams did, though. But after a game like this, maybe it’s worth a try, because I would certainly appreciate the opportunity to let go the reins and spit out the bit and engage in some goofy, pointless horsing around. And given that we were indeed pointless today, I suppose we should saddle up and get out on the trail.
So.
DING! and we’re off and running except actually we’re not so much, not just because we are snakes who thought they were coming to a horse race but because while last year we were at least up against fillies who as I understand are some variety of horse our opponents this morning seem to be small bears, which are much closer to the ground and much more likely to devour snakes, which adds a level of risk that we didn’t face in 2025 because the only danger there was really getting trampled, which certainly did happen and which likely made our Snakes a bit more risk-averse and they certainly seem to be because they seem content to sun themselves in the paddock and not even slither out onto the track except for Corbin Carroll, who apparently is undaunted by the presence of tiny bears on the field and shows it by snaking a ground ball up the first base line for a two-out single and then slithering to second on an Imanaga wild pitch, but he remained there, in the middle of the diamond track, surrounded by bear cubs as the broadcast faded to commercial and he was most likely devoured but finally in the bottom of the first our first quadruped, the Ryno himself, charged out onto the mound and chased off the Cubs who slunk away without even reaching a base and, well, our boys seemed to decide that that was a good choice by the tiny bears because they basically followed suit, and then the Ryno stumbled a bit coming around the first bend and Ian Happ hit one of the baseballs he threw over into the bleachers in left with all the fancy ladies and their fancy hats and their mint juleps to make things 1-0 Chicago and our players remained in the paddock and then Ryno hit a muddy patch on the third stretch that caused him to slow down and throw 30 pitches but he managed to escape thanks to some very nice defense behind him because when there was only one tiny bear on the field the Snakes deemed it safe to come out and sun themselves in the grass a little before retreating again to the safety of the dugout aaand….
/deep breath
and while some of the more mature snakes occasionally ventured out onto the basepaths track during the second lap like Geraldo Perdomo who singled to lead off the fourth and Nolan Arenado who singled to lead off the fifth but both of them, like Carroll right out of the gate found themselves out in the open when the TV faded to black and were likely devoured by bears so the younger snakes I suspect found a pipe or a gutter or something and went to look for where the actual horses are because everyone knows that bears are the last thing you bring to a horse race because whether or not they are full-grown they will send the horses into a panic and besides it allowed them to explore the great city of Chicago and visit the Art Institute and slither around in the sand at the base of that peculiar silvery bean thing on the lakeshore and check out the mysterious elevated subway train that seemed designed to free up the streets for horse races, but they didn’t find any horses but they weren’t missed all that much because nothing much happened for the whole second lap thanks to the baseball gods having decided to arrange the winds so that they were blowing back into the ballpark racetrack which prevented any further bear cubs or any snakes whatsoever from taking flight which was good for our Ryno who has a problem with opponents launching his offerings into space but who kept lumbering on into the sixth furlong, but it also prevented any Diamondbacks from becoming airborne predators which would have been very bad for the city of Chicago as you will know if you ever saw that cinematic masterpiece “Snakes on a Plane” but no, it was all zeroes on both sides through the second lap aaand….
/deep breath
on into the home stretch though Lourdes Gurriel, Jr. risked venturing out onto the bases with a one-out double in the top of the seventh furlong, and young Jose Fernandez got back into the paddock from his outing to the Second City lunchtime set just in time to walk on four pitches which is always weird to say because of the whole snakes/legs thing but once more the TV screen faded to black, leaving both the veteran and the youngster out on the grass to be devoured by bears which was sad and which may have finally dissuaded any other snakes from really trying their luck because no subsequent snakes dared venture out onto the bases while in other news Snake Wrangler Torey Lovullo had returned the Ryno to his pen after 5 2/3 furlongs and gave some others a chance to play, which worked pretty well all things considered as Kevin Ginkel put up a zero, Juan Morillo gave up a run on an Ian Happ triple and a Seika Suzuki sacrifice fly to bring things to 2-0 Chicago before Johnny Lasagna came out to end the bottom of the eighth and our last chance in the top of the ninth ended with three successive ground outs to short against reliever Ben Brown to end this not-very-compelling horse race aaand….
/deep breath
Loss Probability Added, courtesy of FanGraphs
Chief Wallabee [9/1 odds]: Ryne Nelson (5 2/3 IP, 4 H, 1 R, 2 BB, 4 K, 1 HR, 84 pitches thrown,+13% WPA)
The Puma [early betting favorite, withdrew from race]: Our entire offense (31 AB, 4 H, 1 BB, 6 K, -65% WPA)
Perhaps because it was an early start again, and perhaps because the Diamondbacks have not been playing particularly good baseball of late, it was another kind of light Game Day Thread, with 163 comments at time of writing. By popular acclaim, Comment of the Game goes to Snacks&Dbacks for this very true and timely observation:
Of course, Lovullo wound up pulling Nelson one out shy of six full innings. But at least he got closer, with far better results, than our other starters have been managing of late.
Anyhow, join us tomorrow morning once again as we try to avoid getting swept in the Windy City. Struggling mainstay Merrill Kelly goes for us (9.20 ERA, ulp), while struggling Cubs lefty Matthew Boyd (7.00 ERA) takes the mound for Chicago. So at least it should be a somewhat level playing field? First pitch is once again scheduled for 11:20am AZ time. Hope you can join us!
As always, thanks for reading, and as always, go Diamondbacks!
