Fun-loving D-backs expect to compete for playoff berth
PHOENIX -- The last time the Diamondbacks made the playoffs, in 2011, Brad Ziegler joined the team at the trade deadline. He went from a non-contented to a contender in an instant and experienced his first postseason.
The D-backs were non-contenders the past four seasons, but Ziegler thinks that will change this year. He is not alone.
"I want to win. That's the biggest thing. I want to be on a team that competes from the start of the year to the end of the year," Ziegler said. "I've never done it. I want to be part of a team that reels off a 15-5 start and we're just in contention from the start."
The D-backs will look to get off to such a start Monday night when they open the 2016 season against the Rockies on FOX Sports Arizona.
The offseason acquisitions of starting pitchers Zack Greinke and Shelby Miller -- even at high costs -- immediately put the D-backs on the list of teams expected to compete in the National League. Playing in the NL West, alongside fellow contenders the Dodgers and Giants, doesn't dampen expectations.
The late-spring loss of All-Star center fielder A.J. Pollock, however, will be difficult to overcome. The D-backs say they have the depth and resiliency to march on.
"It's part of the game," Paul Goldschmidt said of Pollock's injury, a fractured elbow. "He understands that. We understand that. So to dwell on it is not going to do any good.
"The responsibility is on us as players to step up and do an even better job."
Without Pollock near the top of the lineup and not roaming center field, it is imperative the pitching staff holds its own. The additions of Greinke -- for $206.5 million -- and Miller -- who cost three young, talented players in a trade -- as well as Tyler Clippard in the bullpen and a full season of a healthy Patrick Corbin fuel optimism.
"We want to get off to a good start," said Corbin, who will be limitation-free in his first full season after Tommy John surgery in 2014.
A tone will be set by Greinke on opening night at Chase Field. The right-hander is coming off a 19-3 season with the Dodgers, in which he posted an NL-best 1.66 ERA. He tied an NL record with six consecutive scoreless starts.
"When Zack is pitching, the anxiety is (with) the team that's hitting," Chief Baseball Officer Tony La Russa said, referencing Greinke's social anxiety disorder. "No disrespect to anybody, there some great pitchers, but there's no better No. 1 than our guy. We're looking forward to the anxiety being on the other side, because it won't be on our side."
The D-backs scored the second most runs in the league last season and advanced metrics pegged them as the best defensive team. But gone are outfielders Pollock and Ender Inciarte, who was needed to acquire Miller, both of whom were major cogs in those areas.
If the spring was any indication -- and at least to Greinke, who called Cactus League stats "worthless," it's not -- they may not be missed as much as should be expected.
"It's always good to get in the routine of winning," Daniel Hudson said. "Shaking hands at the end of games is a lot of fun. Even though they don't really count, they count for your confidence levels and stuff like that. You never get sick of winning, so it's fun to have the kind of spring we had. It will be difficult to carry it over but we'll do our best."
The players know their success rate won't be the same. But their process won't change, they say.
"This is a game, whether it's here (Salt River Fields), over there or anywhere," catcher Welington Castillo said. "This is a game. We don't have change anything. We just have to keep going out and having fun. What we've been doing here, we'll do over there (at Chase Field)."
After the franchise's last playoff appearance, it made similar go-for-it roster upgrades in the 2011-12 offseason as were made this winter. Expectations were high then as well. But they fizzled.
"We took a big step back in 2012," Ziegler said. "The expectations and names on paper don't mean a whole lot if you don't go out and do it on the field. That team, we read into the expectations too much. We paid too much attention to it and just kind of expected the success to happen. When it didn't happen we didn't necessarily know how to get out of the funks.
"Whereas this team, this is a close-knit team with a lot of guys who have fun together. I think it's a team that's really going to look forward to coming to the park every day. And that alone is going to make it a better work environment for us."
The D-backs certainly enjoyed the spring in preparing for the long season, and David Peralta said that is only going to continue for the next six-plus months.
"We're just letting them know right now what we're going to do," he said. "Everybody's looking at us like, 'Hey, when we play the D-backs we have to be ready because they're ready and they're not messing around.' Our goal is the World Series. We're feeling confident and we're going to go."
