Wounded Diamondbacks Go for Sweep Against White Sox

The Arizona Diamondbacks will try to get through a baseball game on Wednesday without somebody getting hurt. If they can win on Wednesday they'll have secured a sweep of the Chicago White Sox. First pitch is 11:10 a.m. MST.

Arizona Diamondbacks Injuries

The D-backs have faced a season's worth of injury adversity in the month of June alone, and this past week has seen an acceleration of this shocking trend. In just the last week they've lost three players to the injured list with bone fractures: Gabriel Moreno, Corbin Carroll, and Ildemaro Vargas.

They're also down Eugenio Suarez and Josh Naylor, who both had to come out of Monday night's game. Suarez came out after getting hit on the hand by a pitch and is waiting to have an MRI. He is day-to-day and will not play on Wednesday. Naylor came out with a sore shoulder after an awkward swing and missed Tuesday's game. It's not known as of this writing if he'll be able to play Wednesday.

In the meantime expect infielder Blaze Alexander to be called up prior to the start of the game. He was pulled at the last minute from the Reno Aces' lineup and is traveling from Reno to Chicago overnight.

Arizona Diamondbacks and Chicago White Sox Pitching Matchup

Zac Gallen, RHP 5-8, 5.60 ERA, 5.02 FIP in 91.2 IP

Gallen has made 16 starts this year. Four have been excellent, each resulting in a win. But he's allowed four earned runs or more in 10 starts. His most recent outing he allowed seven runs in five innings, but thanks to his team scoring 14 runs he got the win. He has the highest ERA of any qualified pitcher in MLB.

Gallen continues to point to inconsistencies in his delivery as the problem. But there can be no doubt that his stuff has degraded. FanGraphs publishes a metric called "Stuff+" which grades a pitcher's arsenal on "Important features include, but are not limited to, release point, velocity, vertical and horizontal movement, and spin rate."

Gallen's Stuff+ rating is 90, which ranks 67th out of 70. Gallen's Stuff+ peaked at 105 in 2022, was 98 in 2023, and 92 last year. Whether this is due to his "delivery issues" is difficult to say. But the bottom line is, while he was once thought to be on track for a multi-year, $200 million contract in 2026, he may be forced to sign a short-term deal and hope he can turn his career back around.

RHP Sean Burke, 3-7, 4.50 ERA, 4.89 FIP in 76 IP

Burke is a 25-year-old in his second major league season. He throws a four-seam, slider and curveball, mixing in the occasional changeup and sinker. He averages 94.1 MPH on the fastball but has a high spin rate and gets good ride on the pitch. He's been mistake-prone with the slider, giving up seven homers on the pitch.

Burke has allowed two runs or less in seven of his last nine starts, with two clunkers in between. His most recent outing was against the St. Louis Cardinals. He went 5.1 innings giving up two runs, one earned in a no-decision.

Lineups

(Check back closer to game time for updated lineup info and analysis)

D-backs and White Sox Bullpens

The D-backs had to use five relievers to record 12 outs Tuesday night to secure the victory. That included all of their high-leverage relievers, and Shelby Miller to get the save. He needed just 12 pitches however, and should be able to go on back-to-back days.

White Sox closer Grant Taylor hasn't gotten to work in this series or show off his 100 MPH fastball. He has just six major league games under his belt so far. He's struck out seven, and walked one, allowing 2 runs in six innings.

Arizona Diamondbacks Latest News