The Arizona Diamondbacks were able to split a series against the best team in baseball on Thursday afternoon thanks to some fantastic outings from some pretty unlikely pitching heroes. This is why we love baseball!
If I would’ve polled Dbacks fans a couple of weeks ago if they knew a pitcher by the name of Nabil Crismatt, there may have been a couple of them that remembered him from his brief stint with the team in 2023, or perhaps his time with the Padres, but it would’ve been a lot of blank stares from the majority of the fanbase. Fast forward to today, Crismatt put up another solid outing going 5.2 IP of 4 run ball, however just 2 of the runs were earned. His ERA on the season now stands at just 1.84 after 2 starts and another outing in which the team used an opener, but Crismatt pitched the bulk of the innings.
Offensively, both Tyler Locklear and Alek Thomas led the team with 2 RBI’s each. Locklear interestingly enough didn’t even record a hit, although he was robbed of what would have been a 2 run home run in the top of the 5th inning. That ball was hit at 106 mph and traveled 404ft and would have been a home run in 19 other ballparks. Good sign if he is starting to get going!
Lourdes Gurriel Jr. also continued his torrid August going 3-4, and Gabi Moreno also stayed hot since coming back from the IL contributing 2 hits of his own. It should probably be noted however that the Dbacks went just 2-14 with RISP in the game. A trend that has come in waves through out the course of the season.
However, the story of the game was the 29 year old right hander making his major league debut, Taylor Rashi. Rashi entered the game in a pretty pivotal spot in the bottom of the 7th with a 2 run lead against the best team in baseball and he was able to hold them right there for 3 impressive innings! Rashi was also able to make some history in the effort as he is now the 16th different pitcher with the Dbacks to record a save this season. An MLB record for most different pitchers to record a save for a single team in a season. Probably doesn’t say much about your bullpen, but hey a record is a record. Rashi reminds me of a Josh Collmenter/ Kyle Amendt disciple with a straight over the top arm angle that makes his 90 mph fastball play up at the top of the zone. Rashi complements that high riding fastball with a curveball and a splitter that dive deep in the zone giving him a very intriguing vertical profile and a definitely funky look out of the bullpen.
Regardless of the Dbacks record at this point of the season, people should be pretty encouraged that this team just went toe to toe with the best team in baseball and it looked like a pretty evenly matched bout! Especially when you consider all of the star power that was jettisoned away at the trade deadline and the fact that we started some dude named Nabil Crismatt and closed with some dude named Taylor Rashi. This team has a pretty solid core and a couple of instances of some better luck with pitching injuries and it could very well be a much different situation this team is finding itself in going into September.