Diamondbacks Travel To Philadelphia To Take On Phillies
The Arizona Diamondbacks (15-18) travel to Philadelphia to take on the Phillies (13-23) in a three-game set beginning Friday evening. The Diamondbacks are coming off a series loss to the surging Washington Nationals, while the Phillies are coming off a four-game series split with the Pittsburgh Pirates.
Both teams will come into this series with a bit of a limp. Arizona has lost four of their last six, while the Phillies have lost six of their last nine. Neither team looks like a world-beater when you’re looking at pitching statistics; in fact, they both sport a nearly identical team ERA (4.26 for Philadelphia, 4.29 for the Diamondbacks).
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However, the Diamondbacks pummel the Phillies when it comes to offensive statistics. Arizona ranks in the top ten in baseball when it comes to runs scored, hits, batting average, and on base percentage. The Phillies rank in the bottom five in all of those categories except for hits, where they’re still stuck in the bottom ten in baseball.
The Diamondbacks also feature a .991 fielding percentage, which is impressive when you consider the mistakes that Mark Trumbo has made in the outfield. The Phillies? .979, good for fifth worst in the league.
Not many people expect either of these teams to do too much this year, but if any team should be favored here, it’s the Diamondbacks. If Arizona has any hope of making some noise in the NL West this year, they have to pile up wins against blatantly bad teams like the Phillies.
Here are the lineups for Friday’s matchup.
Here’s the reason for Hill and Tomas being out of the lineup.
Aaron Hill still not feeling well. Had to leave Wednesday's game because of it. Yasmany Tomas also under the weather. Both out of lineup.
— Nick Piecoro (@nickpiecoro) May 15, 2015
Good news on the injury front for the Diamondbacks: Archie Bradley, who took a Carlos Gonzalez line drive off the face, is penciled in to get the start on Saturday and be opposed by Jerome Williams. Sunday’s game will feature Josh Collmenter and Sean O’Sullivan.
The first two games of the series will start at 4:05 Arizona time, while Sunday’s game will be an early start at 10:35 AM Arizona time.