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I'll be honest: the Arizona Diamondbacks were my preseason pick to represent the National League in the World Series. It certainly didn't seem like a bad pick at the time, as they returned almost everybody from a team that won the NL West in 2011 and had the benefit of a system stocked with pitching, as well as a full year of Paul Goldschmidt, to help them along the way. Those should have served as great complementary pieces to an already-established core of nearly star-level players like Justin Upton, Miguel Montero, Chris Young, Ian Kennedy and more. Plus, they signed Jason Kubel, a guy who would be available to provide power at a moment's notice.
For whatever reason, the D-Backs just couldn't quite figure it out in 2012. Upton's struggles are probably at the top of the list of those reasons. While he didn't have a terrible season, Upton's .279/.353/.432 line was a big dropoff from his stellar 2011 campaign, in which he slugged .529 and hit 31 homers. Upton may be an every-other-year type, as he experienced a similar dropoff in 2010 after breaking out in 2009.
Chris Young started off blistering-hot, as he put up a 1.387 OPS during the first couple of weeks of the season before getting injured. He never regained his form, hitting just .204/.283/.370 since returning a month later.
The pitching certainly wasn't bad, even though Kennedy regressed to league-average, with Wade Miley and his 126 ERA+ anchoring a staff that also included Trevor Cahill (111 ERA+). Joe Saunders was average until he was traded to the Baltimore Orioles, while Josh Collmenter performed poorly in the rotation before finding his form in the bullpen. The rotation suffered a big blow early on, as Daniel Hudson (113 ERA+ in 2011) got off to a bad start (57 ERA+) before landing on the disabled list for the remainder of the season.
Still, with Hill's huge year (130 OPS+, 24 HR, two cycles) and an exceptional amount of power from the bat of Jason Kubel (.506 SLG, 30 HR), you'd figure that would have been enough to push the D-Backs over the top. But, as is the case in baseball sometimes, it just didn't happen. Maybe it's because they didn't get the help they needed from the young arms, maybe it's because the combination of Young and Upton were underwhelming ... hell, maybe it's because they have too god damn many burly white guys with red beards on their team. But, it just didn't happen.
As for this series, we all know how bad the Rockies have been historically at Chase Field -- 41 games under .500, in fact. And, even though Arizona has been eliminated from playoff contention, it still has a shot at a winning record this season if it's able to win two games in this series. I expect the D-Backs to play hard and do what they always do against the Rockies at home -- take care of business. Arizona wins two out of three, but the Rockies avoid 100 losses. Sweet. Everybody wins.
Probable pitchers
Monday, Oct. 1 at 7:40 p.m. MT
Drew Pomeranz (2-9, 5.01 ERA) vs. Wade Miley (16-11, 3.32 ERA)
Tuesday, Oct. 2 at 7:40 p.m. MT
Jhoulys Chacin (3-5, 4.78) vs. Patrick Corbin (6-8, 4.77)
Wednesday, Oct. 3 at 5:10 p.m. MT
Jeff Francis (5-7, 5.75) vs. Ian Kennedy (15-11, 4.16)