The Arizona Diamondbacks and San Francisco Giants collide this weekend at Oracle Park as the top two teams in the National League West almost halfway through the season.
The D-backs enter the streak winning five of seven games, including a rescheduled contest against the Washington Nationals on Thursday.
The Giants reeled off 10 straight wins — including a sweep of the Los Angeles Dodgers — before falling to the San Diego Padres on Thursday.
The D-backs (46-30) hold a 3.5-game lead over the Giants (42-33) in a division expected to go down to the wire.
FanGraphs projects the D-backs to win 90 games, the Dodgers 89, the Giants 87 and the Padres 85.
Both the D-backs and Giants were seen as underdogs entering the year against the Dodgers and Padres, and this series is an opportunity for Arizona to continue to build distance at the top or San Francisco to reach the doorstep.
“You walk into a visiting stadium, the second-place team playing great baseball, and if you can’t expect that and rise up for that, then you’re not doing the right things the right way,” the D- Backs, Torey. Lovullo told him Arizona Sports’ Burns & Gambo on Friday. “Our guys are ready to go. … It can be easy to say, ‘We’ve got to go up there and win two out of three,’ but we’ve been so good at breaking it down every day.”
Friday will be Arizona’s first NL West game since June 1 against the Rockies.
Match notes
The D-backs and Giants had a four-game series in May at Chase Field, and Arizona took the final three games. The streak ended with a Lourdes Gurriel Jr. double. on Mother’s Day.
Lourdes Gurriel Jr. is one #walk hero on mother’s day.
(MLB x @CapitalOne) pic.twitter.com/lKx9UWAqCp
— MLB (@MLB) May 14, 2023
Since then, the Giants and D-backs are Nos. 3 and 5 in MLB in runs scored, respectively, and San Francisco has the best team ERA in the majors over that span at 3.24.
The potential starting pitchers for this series start with Zach Davies (7.11 ERA) against Logan Webb (3.11) on Friday, Merrill Kelly (2.90) against TBA on Saturday and Ryne Nelson (5.31) against Anthony DeSclafani (4.38) in the series finale of on sunday.
Webb pitched seven innings of one-run ball during that Mother’s Day contest. He has thrown at least seven frames in seven of his last nine outings.
Davies, meanwhile, has had consecutive starts lasting less than four innings.
San Francisco’s bullpen has thrown 315 innings, third-most in baseball, and has an MLB-best 1.93 ERA since May 22.
The Giants have used the bullpen this season with great success, as reliever Ryan Walker has started two games this week that ended in wins.
Their staff will face three of the top eight NL hitters this month in terms of OPS: Corbin Carroll (1.095), Ketel Marte (1.027) and Christian Walker (1.005).
Geraldo Perdomo has taken the lead against righties to stellar results, as he is hitting .371 in that role.
The Giants have a balanced offensive attack with LaMonte Wade Jr. and Joc Pederson crushing righties this season with an .899 and .906 OPS, respectively.
Arizona 12-2 on the road in their last 14 games.
The D-backs will continue to be tested with the Tampa Bay Rays coming to Chase Field starting Tuesday and a road trip to the Los Angeles Angels next weekend.
Catch all three games in San Francisco on 98.7, the Arizona Sports app and ArizonaSports.com.
