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These two teams have been in the two wild-card slots in the National League for virtually the entire season. The Brewers and Cardinals got close, but in the end Arizona and Colorado prevailed and will meet for the chance to take on the Dodgers in a division series.
Arizona had the better regular-season record, but don’t count the Rockies offense out. The Rox led the N.L. in runs with 824 (two more than the Cubs), but Arizona wasn’t far behind at 812. The difference was in the pitching, where the D-backs were second-best in the N.L. at 659 runs allowed, and Colorado gave up nearly 100 more (757).
With Arizona at home, where they posted a 52-29 record, they should be heavily favored tonight. They went 11-8 against the Rockies this year.
There is no Game 2. Here’s how they’ll line up for the NL #WildCard game. https://t.co/RUkyin5vbM pic.twitter.com/IlmRBncajm
— MLB Lineups (@mlblineups) October 4, 2017
Zack Greinke vs. Jon Gray
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One of the biggest factors in Arizona’s good year is the comeback of Zack Greinke from a bad 2016. Greinke’s ERA in the second half, though, was nearly a run higher than earlier in the season. He did throw fairly well against the Rox this year: 3.41 ERA, 0.937 WHIP in five starts, which included just two (!) walks in 34⅓ innings. Greinke was also much better at home than on the road this year.
Jon Gray was selected immediately after Kris Bryant in the 2013 draft’s first round. He’s had some injury issues and made just 20 starts this year, missing a couple of months with a stress fracture in a toe. He pitched fairly well in those 20 starts (3.67 ERA, 1.296 WHIP, 3.18 FIP), and his last five starts have been particularly good: 2.10 ERA, 0.933 WHIP, just four walks in 30 innings.
Here is the complete MLB.com Mediacenter for today.
MLB.com Gameday (classic mode) (Note: Going forward, I am going to link to the “classic” Gameday here because MLB.com broke the links I used to use to get to their “new” Gameday. If you click on this link, you can then click on “New Gameday” at the bottom of the page to get to the updated version. Note that the “classic” Gameday won’t load until just before game time.)
Baseball-reference.com game preview
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This will be the only thread for tonight’s game. Enjoy, and discuss amongst yourselves.