Gameday Thread, #161: 9/27 @ Padres

Well, I guess we can’t complain too much if the 161st game of the year is the first one which is not “meaningful” in terms of the D-backs making the post-season. We’re now reduced to rooting for other teams – most probably the Reds – to make the post-season. I’m really hoping the Mets lose: ideally in the same kind of tie-breaker scenario they colluded with the Braves (/adjusts tin-foil hat) to eliminate the D-backs last year. At time of writing, they are up on the Marlins, with the Reds facing the Brewers, later in a game which will have been underway for about an hour at the time this gets published.

As for Arizona? It’s down to personal and team numbers. Most obviously, the team sit at 80-80 with two games to play. So they could still end up with a winning record, a losing record or neither. The team has twice before ended the season exactly at .500 – oddly, those campaigns came in consecutive years, 2012 and 2013. Since then, the closest has been in 2018, when they were walked off by the Padres in the final contest of the year, to finish at 82-80. But that year, a .500 finish was off the books before the final game: this time, it’s definitely going to go right to the wire, regardless of tonight’s result.

Geraldo Perdomo has probably most to battle for on the individual level. He needs one home-run and two RBI, to reach 20 and 100 respectively. No pure D-backs shortstop has ever reached those numbers – I say “pure” because Tony Batista did in 1999, albeit more with Toronto than in Arizona. If Perdomo appears in tomorrow’s game too, he’ll be the first D-back since Gonzo in 2001 to appear 161 times in a season (Gonzalez played all 162 games in both 2000 and 2001). Elsewhere, Gabriel Moreno and Alek Thomas each need one home-run for double digits. Already locked in: the second time over a full season Arizona will have nobody with more than 10 saves. In 2021, the highest was SIX by Joakim Soria and Tyler Clippard.