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The Arizona Diamondbacks are in a hard way right now. In the midst of a 5 game losing streak they currently sit at 14-18, six and a half games out of first place in the National League West behind the Los Angeles Dodgers. For a team that had high expectations going into this season this is alarming.
But don’t push the panic button just yet D-Backs fans. Although things look bleak never forget that last year at this time the D-Backs were in a very similar situation last year, they were 14-17 through 31 games, the exact same record that they had going into Wednesday. Yet that D-Backs team came back to win the National League West.
This year the D-backs have more to look forward to than they did last year. There is help coming soon down the line.
Right now center fielder Chris Young, short stop Stephen Drew, and pitcher Daniel Hudson are all on the disabled list right now. Those are your anchors in the outfield, middle infield, and starting rotation. Things should hopefully start to turn around when those three are back in the fold for the D-Backs.
Despite the injuries to Young and Drew, the D-Backs offense is not lacking. They have scored the sixth most runs in the National League this season. And the D-Backs have been scoring multiple runs against teams with solid pitching staffs, like the Braves, Pirates, Phillies, and Nationals.
This is in no small part to Jason Kubel having a hot bat to start the season. Don’t forget though that last year the D-Backs got a lot of production from non-key players, they will need players like Ryan Roberts and Paul Goldschmidt to find their strokes again to help out.
Now it is hard to ignore the failings of the pitching staff right now, with a 4.21 ERA and only 219 strike outs on the year, both in the bottom half of the National League.
But you have to trust that the pitching staff can pull things together, and start to pitch like they did last year. But this is a point of concern right now, pitching was one of the strongest parts of the team last year, and now they are its biggest liability.
If things truly get bad for the D-backs they do have some young guns in the minors, Trevor Bauer and Tyler Skaggs, that can come up and hopefully bring a flash of life into a beleaguered pitching staff.
Oh and never forget that it is only the beginning of May right now. There is still a lot of baseball still to be played. Manager Kirk Gibson did much more with less last year, if there is a man who can bring the D-Backs out of this slump it is Gibby.
Never forget your history either, the 2003 Florida Marlins were at one point in the season as much as 20 games back of first place, they only went on to take the wildcard and win the world series.
Plus D-Backs fans it could be a lot worse, you could be the Minnesota Twins.
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