You're The Star! Eight Exciting Endings!

You are the Diamondbacks manager, and you find yourself in an intense interleague game against our established rivals, the ... Cleveland Indians. As Daniel Hudson delivers the first pitch, you must navigate a stagnant offense and sporadic bullpen to emerge victorious. Can you use fieryness and a complete disregard of situational stats to guide your team to victory?

What happens next in the story? It all depends on the choices you make. How does the story end? Only you can find out! And the best part is that you can keep reading and rereading until you've had not one but many incredibly daring experiences!

Click the links to "turn" the pages and try to make it through to a Diamondbacks win! It won't be easy...

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Vince Carter had a birthday in this game, and overall you could say it was a pretty good game for Carter, although I'm actually going to post 150 reasons why it wasn't. He still showed his trademark disinterest in getting within 12 feet of the basket. Honestly, I think he might have some kind of rare allergy and we should stop being so mean to him. Constructing some kind of bubble for Vince might allow him to hit more threes, which is Carter's main reason for being out there anyway.

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Like the last time I did a recap, the Diamondbacks played in front of a franchise-worst crowd in Wednesday's game. Through seven innings, they were treated to a sterling display of baseball -- strong offense, good enough pitching, and they even had free tacos locked up by then. Unfortunately, though, baseball continues to employ a pesky system where they expect teams to play nine innings, and that cost Arizona dearly tonight.

More after the jump...

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Another week, another loss to recap. If this team hadn't made me numb to the whole process by now, this would probably hurt or something.

Craig Stammen -- yes, that Craig Stammen -- snuck through five innings, Adam Dunn hit two colossal home runs, and Mark Reynolds still seemed to be a little loopy as the Nationals crushed Arizona 7-2. For the strong of heart, there's more after the jump.

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All right, so the team isn't leaving until after tomorrow's game (although one could argue they never showed up in Philly in the first place, given their performance in the first two games), and they'll probably be taking a plane and not a helicopter. Oh well.

In today's outing, the Diamondbacks ran smack into the immovable force known as Roy Halladay, and a much-heralded prospect licked his chops at the chance to make his debut against our abysmal pitching staff. The results were predictable, depressing, and nigh unwatchable. But someone had to document it, and as such, the Chronicles of Ridiculous continue after the jump...

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Forget about Tankapalooza. Despite a lethargic offense most of the night, punctuated only by quick bursts and solo home runs, the Diamondbacks pulled out a 14-inning nail-biter against the Mets on Wednesday night. The marathon game lasted almost five hours, but Arizona earned their first sweep since last season (a two-game set against the Giants in May notwithstanding) thanks to Chris Snyder's one-out double to win it.

More details after the jump...

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Somehow, I don't imagine the Diamondbacks were hoping to start this homestand, the first games under the iron mustache fist of Kirk Gibson, 1-4. They were certainly trying not to go 1-5 in last night's game, but trying's only half of the game, and it's the execution part where Arizona has had particular trouble this season. After the jump, a curtailed recap thanks to massive computer issues and feeling the need...the need for sleep.

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The Diamondbacks headed into today's series finale with the Cardinals looking to maintain a shred of decency. After all, it was arguable which of their two previous losses was most pathetic - an 8-0 shelling that was never in doubt, or a 6-5 debacle where someone in the Arizona infield seemed to have had money on St. Louis. To do so, the team sent up Barry Enright for his major league debut, as he took Edwin Jackson's spot in the rotation after his laboring no-no.

Well, the rook got a win in his first start, thanks to some timely offense - sort of - and a reasonable outing from the bullpen.

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Arizona headed into tonight's series finale with the chance to take two of three from The New York Yankees, silencing half the patrons in attendance and getting some much-needed momentum. What happened instead was equal parts dramatic and awful. Timely hitting in some spots, and failure in others. Good bullpen work some innings, and crippling blows in others.

Follow me after the jump, and I'll tell you a story: The Adventure of Lord Dontrelle, and The Team That Rallied Behind Him But Wasn't Good Enough Anyway.

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The Diamondbacks headed into tonight's game against the Red Sox looking to avoid making some bad history. Having already lost 11 straight on the road, they faced the tall task of having to do so against Jon Lester, and while Rodrigo Lopez has contributed more than we could have asked to this point, it was still something of a mismatch. Sometimes baseball games have surprise endings or take a roller coaster ride to get to their endpoint -- this was not one of those games.

More details after the jump.

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This had all the makings of a snoozefest. Seven innings of no scoring, yet the game labored on at a mind-numbing pace. Repeated wasted opportunities with runners in scoring position. Some weird guy chatting with Jack Magruber on Fox Sports. All of that changed in the eighth inning, however, with one of the strangest plays we've seen in a while -- and that's saying something, given the state of Diamondbacks baseball in 2010 so far. Luckily, since the players involved are largely okay, we can talk about it without hushed tones.

More information about the wild ride after the jump ...

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In the last Azrecap featuring Mad Libs, I provided some options for you to choose from in constructing your own recap. A few were hilarious, and yes, I am modest. This time around, we're going with the full-fledged old-school model, where every bit of the puzzle is up to you. YOU have the power to make an otherwise forgettable game turn into a lasting memory. YOU can finally step up to the plate and have your very own recap on the AZ Snakepit. Are YOU a bad enough dude to save the president? Well, start by filling in these blanks and then see how they apply after the jump:

ADVERB: __________
ADJECTIVE: __________
ADJECTIVE 2: __________
NOUN: __________
ADJECTIVE 3: __________
VERB ENDING IN -ED: __________
NUMBER GREATER THAN 10: __________
VERB: __________
NOUN 2: __________
CELESTIAL BODY: __________
ALCOHOLIC BEVERAGE: __________
VERB ENDING IN -ING: __________
ADJECTIVE 4: __________
NOUN 3: __________
NOUN 4: __________
EFFEMINATE CELEBRITY: __________
VERB 2: __________
ADVERB 2: __________
VERB ENDING IN -ED 2: __________
NUMBER GREATER THAN 100: __________
PLURAL NOUN: __________
FARAWAY PLACE: __________
PLURAL NOUN 2: __________
SNAKEPIT USER: __________
NAME OF BOY BAND: __________
ADJECTIVE 5: __________

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Supposedly, my recaps are usually interesting games. Yeah, that's a vague adjective that can be used to describe just about anything. But if you go through the history of Azrecaps, there's something to the notion.

Tonight was not one of those nights.

Neither team could muster much offense, even though both starting pitchers were far from dominant. Despite falling into an early hole, the Diamondbacks had a chance to steal this game in Coors Field, but came up short at the end.

More on this game after the jump, if I can manage to avoid talking about the Suns instead...

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During the broadcast of Wednesday night's game, Daron Sutton stumbled a bit trying to get across a certain bit of information about the past that Arizona was trying to avoid -- namely, that the Diamondbacks hadn't been this terrible in a homestand since the dreaded 2004 season. They lost 11 straight in one homestand that year en route to 111 losses, as most D-back fans can painfully recollect on their own. They'd been swept in three-game series since then, but back-to-back series at home? Nope. Not in six years.

Of course, that's just what they did tonight, getting outscored 52-15 in the process. That kind of margin makes it pretty easy to spread the blame around to just about everyone. And we'll do just that after the jump.

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Record: 10-11. Pace: 77-85. Change on last season: +1.

Man, winning a series is tough. At least, it seemed that way in this afternoon’s game, which flirted with becoming an evening one. The Diamondbacks and Rockies battled long and hard for a late-April victory, plowing through their bullpens in the process. Ultimately, though, one team was unable to answer the bell in the late rounds.

Details about the pitching massacre and wild ride after the jump.

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Having dropped the opener to the Dodgers, the Diamondbacks came into tonight's game looking to even the series at a game apiece, and stay over .500 in the process. Given the team's struggles against Los Angeles since they acquired that left fielder with moldy Tootsie Rolls for hair (9-19 against the Dodgers since mid-2008), they faced an uphill battle, especially depending on Rodrigo Lopez to outpitch Chad Billingsley. As it turned out, neither pitcher was that much of a factor in the ultimate outcome, and both were out of the game approximately 17 hours before the game finally finished.

After the jump, a lot of words about a lot of crappy baseball.

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Record: 2-1. Pace: 108-54. Change on 2009: +1

Arizona came into tonight’s game looking to win its first series of the newborn season. Sure, their 162-0 year had been ruined, but there was still a lot to play for, right? I mean, with 160 games left, I guess there’s playoffs and wild cards and other things to consider that might be worthwhile.

After the jump, a sudden outburst of offense for one player who’d been hitless, and another bad luck outing for a starter. What’s different in 2010 so far? We won despite that luck…

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I know, you've been chomping at the bit to know what the answers were. What's that? Some of you didn't take the quiz yet? Well, you're in luck; the link is still active and the answer key is after the jump. Quick, click here before you peek at the results. For the rest of the class, your grades are in red ink at the top of the next page...

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Record: 68-90. Pace. 69-93. Change on last season: -12.

For my final recap of the season, I had high hopes that the Diamondbacks would do something interesting that also qualified as "good." You know, scoring more than three runs, not having any baserunning gaffes, getting a dominating performance from the starting pitcher...that kind of stuff. Instead, I got another abysmal offensive performance, the pitcher caught in a rundown, and Kevin Mulvey on the mound. Thank you, baseball gods. Thanks a lot.

Meanwhile, a Diamondback from the days of yore (Brad Penny) licked his chops about the prospects of facing the mighty Arizona lineup, and the only positive that could be gleaned from this game was that its completion moved us one game closer to the end of the season. Good times.

Still, I hedged my bets that this game would be uninteresting and did something else on the side for the season finale. There's a trivia contest inside, although I'm unable to offer any prizes other than compliments about how smart you are. Maybe that'll take the edge off more than reading about another boring loss.

An actual recap, and details about the quiz, after the jump...

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Record: 64-83. Pace: 71-91. Change on last season: -9

As a baseball fan, aren't these the kind of September games you root for? Afternoon baseball between two teams fighting for superiority in their division, with the road team going for a series sweep against the team with a one-game lead on them.

All right, all right. By superiority I mean "worst superiority," as the Diamondbacks and Padres battled each other in their race for the cellar. Today's matchup featured Doug Davis against little-known Edward Mujica. Davis was looking to overcome a terrible start his last time out, and Mujica was looking to maybe make it into the fifth inning or something. But it was a certain young outfielder who stole the show, at least until an epic collapse in the ninth inning when the D-backs were just two strikes from a victory. And then...some things happened. But those and other descriptions...

...are after the jump.

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Record: 62-79. Pace: 70-92. Change on last season: -9.

The Diamondbacks headed into tonight's matchup with the Dodgers looking for something, anything to take as a positive. Six straight losses (including a particularly bad one last night, with a three-run lead in the eighth) had the D-backs in sole possession of last place. Just to add to the confusion, their old buddy Jon Garland toed the rubber against Dan Haren in tonight's series finale. Neither starter ended up being a factor in the decision, and a closely contested game ended with perhaps the most anticlimactic way possible (unless you like waiting two seconds to see if an overweight guy raises his arm or not).

Dreadlocks and base knocks after the jump...

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Max Scherzer took the mound against the Dodgers tonight, and the word of the day was consistency. In his past six starts, Max had a 6.47 ERA and only made it through the sixth inning once. Facing a potent offense on a team fighting for a postseason spot and the Dodgers' ace in Chad Billingsley, this had all the makings of a pitchers' duel...or a disaster. In a way, it ended up being both; the offense was missing for about eight innings, and the usual warning signs of a no decision for our starter were lit up in all their neon glory.

Sounds like the rest of the season, right? Except this one actually worked out in the Diamondbacks' favor. Stunning, I know.

Ten minutes of offense and another promising start from our young fireballer after the jump.

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Record 55-72. Pace: 70-90. Change on last season: -12.

Tonight, the Diamondbacks faced a lofty task: finding a way to beat the best pitcher in major-league history. That's right, the D-backs were up against Jonathan Sanchez, a first-ballot hall-of-famer with a heart of gold, and had to rely on lowly Doug Davis to get the job done.

The word for the games I recap is usually "interesting." Granted, interesting is such a generic adjective that it's hard not to find a way for every game to fit it somehow, but this was a prime example of legitimate "interesting." As in, it's interesting how we managed to blow a three-run lead late and lose another one-run decision.

An attempt to differentiate this loss from all the others after the jump...

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Record: 54-67. Pace: 72-90. Change on last season: -8.

This was a dreadful performance. Sure, it was against the reigning AL Cy Young winner, who has been almost untouchable since switching to the NL last month (4-0, 0.82 ERA, 0.73 WHIP). And yes, it was after three other awful games this week -- getting shelled by the Dodgers, getting destroyed by six unearned runs against the Braves (although some of them certainly should have been earned), and then being rocked to sleep by a 95-year-old lefty out of the bullpen in the series opener. So maybe we shouldn't have been surprised. Maybe we should have seen this coming.

Still, after a pretty successful road trip (albeit against a pretty bad set of teams), there were a few reasons to be optimistic about this team. Those reasons are tough to remember now.

There may be more depressed writing and obscure John Wayne references after the jump.

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Record: 53-63. Pace: 74-88. Change on last season: -6.

Before the season started, it would have been hard to believe that the Diamondbacks would be 17 games behind the Dodgers in the middle of August, but that's exactly where Arizona stood heading into this three-game set against L.A. So maybe this series doesn't have quite the impact we might have expected -- taking out the boys in blue (no, not Jerry Crawford) is always a worthy endeavor.

Dan Haren toed the rubber for the D-backs tonight against young phenom Clayton Kershaw, and it seemed an appropriate time for Haren to get rid of his usual second-half demons and put together a good start. In his last four outings, Haren wasn't quite up to his usual standards: a 6.26 ERA, less than six innings per start, and a K:BB ratio just over three. Meanwhile, Kershaw had been pulling a Jekyll/Hyde routine lately -- 15 shutout innings against the Cardinals and Braves, but a disastrous four-inning start (4 H, 3 ER, 6 BB against the Brewers) in between. Fortunately for the Diamondbacks, he was more mortal than monster on this night.

Haren's great outing and some shady shenanigans after the jump...

[Update] Andre Ethier calls Haren "afraid to pitch." Could be a couple of interesting games the rest of the series.

Audio courtesy of KTAR 620

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Record: 52-63. Pace: 74-88. Change on last season: -7.

In last week's recap, the Diamondbacks overcame some horrendous performances with RISP to somehow squeak out a win against the hapless Pirates. Most of those failures came in the first seven innings of the game before they finally came through in a clutch situation in the eighth. The situation was eerily familiar in this afternoon's contest against the Mets, only the first chink in the ineptitude armor came with two outs in the seventh -- although they had wasted twice as many opportunities to that point. This might be the worst game of the season in terms of consistent failure; the Florida game at least had the decency to cram it all into a couple of awful innings.

Today's matchup featured Jon Garland against Oliver Perez. Garland struggles at home; Perez struggles in general. Keep in mind, the team wasted its first 12 opportunities with runners in scoring position. It gave away three runs on what should have been just one hit in the sixth. There were four wild pitches in a three-inning span. Perez somehow walked a tight rope with high heels and a suit of armor on. This was a game the Diamondbacks had no business winning, yet it was a tie game with just two frames to go. Words somehow cannot adequately convey the frustration.

A breakdown of the breakdowns and Mark Grace's guttural noises after the jump...

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We've talked here before about Mark Reynolds' outside chance at becoming the first member of the 50 HR-30 SB club (Larry Walker was closest in 1997), which would be a hugely impressive accomplishment. But he's already joining some exclusive company in baseball history as we speak, uncharted territory for a pretty successful franchise in its first decade-plus of existence.

Two plateaus of note after the jump...

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