Carroll made a rehab start this week and played seven innings, 4ABs. How much of an impact will his return have?

I certainly hope it’s huge. But offense really hasn’t been a problem at all this year. So while he’s a huge bat, I don’t know if we’ll be winning more games because of him.

I don’t think Carroll will make much of a difference in un-cursing this cursed Dbacks 2025 season. Don’t get me wrong, he is evolving into a potential MVP level talent, but there’s just too much that’s gone wrong on the pitching staff. They don’t need to improve the offense, they need a couple of competent starting pitchers and relievers to appear out of thin air from the farm system and immediately contribute, and that’s highly unlikely, if not nigh impossible. Since we’re already on the subject, hear me out for one moment: The Arizona Diamondbacks (with their top three offense and bottom five pitching) FUSE temporarily with idk.. the Kansas City Royals (#2 in team ERA, #25 team OPS) using the power of friendship, love, and the ability to both hit AND pitch to defeat the Dodgers/Yankees fusion in the climatic anime-esque finale of the 2025 season! (If the editor was cool he’d insert an animated GIF of the fusion dance from Dragonball Z/Super, but with the D’backs and Royals logos pasted over the two character’s heads)

Obviously there will be something of an impact here, but like Spencer already mentioned, the .

: Yeah, the offense isn’t the problem. I just hope Corbin/the team aren’t trying to rush him back too soon.

This season, Corbin Carroll’s 150 OPS+ shows his return will positively impact offense. Offense is a team effort.

We will now lose games 9-4 instead of 9-3

Assuming that there are no lingering effects, the return of Carroll can hardly be anything other than a good thing. Sure, the offense has been largely holding its own in his absence. But there is something to be said for having his energy out there to help keep everyone fired up. I’m still only cautiously optimistic this is going to work out though. Carroll returned to action last night and didn’t look bad at the plate, despite not getting a big hit. But I am having terrible flashbacks to when the Diamondbacks rushed another injured outfielder back from injury because the team had hit a rough patch. It didn’t work out well for the player or the team. Carroll’s next six seasons are more important than the next six weeks of games.

Yeah, there’s little argument to be made that Carroll’s return isn’t a definite upgrade for the team. Like James, I worry about him rushing himself back in a Quixotic hope that it will be the magical difference in the season. Unfortunately, unless he suddenly becomes the Ohtani of the Valley, it likely won’t mean much for the year’s direction.

Is there anyone on an expiring contract you wouldn’t trade in a sell situation? Who and why.

Absolutely not. If you really love the player, go re-sign him and let him play alongside the return he netted. The closest I’d get is lack of depth, mostly for Suarez. But if we’re selling, sell. A big hole at 3B just means a better chance at a lottery pick in the draft as far as I’m concerned.

Honestly, I’d consider anyone controlled only through 2026 as well. We can hope all we want for next season but reality is what it is. Tommy John returns are iffy at best. Look no further than Sandy Alcantara this year; healthy doesn’t mean back to fighting shape right away. While we’ll get to see Burnes and Martinez and the long list of others back in June/July of 2026 (ideally), expecting them to pitch quality innings before April 2027 is unrealistic.

I would trade anyone that isn’t under control past this season, but that’s assuming you’re getting back players that will hit the ground running by ‘27. If you’re trading players under control through next season as well, then it’s imperative you get quality and quantity back in return.

I don’t think any player should necessarily be off=limits in a trade, but I’m absolutely not advocating for trading players just for its own sake. What I was advocating for was trading Zac Gallen a year ago while his value was at its highest. They could have gotten a sizable return if they had moved him at the deadline or possibly even during the off-season. However, Gallen’s trade value is close to bottoming out completely now, the best that they’re going to get back talent wise is the compensation pick they’d get from rejecting a QO. (I’m also vehemently against trading away what amounts to dozens of years of team control for a half season, or even worse, twenty four games of ONE player?)

Honestly, unless we are talking about a Juan Soto kind of player or Max Scherzer some years back, trading a player on an expiring contract with 2 months of play left isn’t going to get us many quality players back. These are mostly salary dumps and “take what you can get”. I think the biggest decision would be surrounding He is an obvious candidate to accept the QO and if not, I think the compensation pick would be a bigger haul than anything we could get for his 5+ ERA right now. I don’t think the two remaining starts in July would change the outlook much for him. So, I would not trade Zac Gallen.

: Maybe Suarez or Miller. I think I would be listening to all offers and it wouldn’t take much for me to move them. I wouldn’t be “disappointed” if they are still here on August 1st.

I think the answer to that question depends on Lawler’s health. We need someone who can play third base, and even in sell mode I can’t bring myself to say Blaze Alexander, starting third baseman, so Geno is a maybe for me.

Zac Gallen. In the offseason, Jack Sommers estimated his trade value at $14 Million. This season’s 77 ERA+ lowered that trade value. His Baseball Savant percentile rankings show a sea of blue. One of his better numbers is 57th percentile in whiffs. Could another team find value in him? Another possibility is that his performance surges in the second half, making him a sure bet to reject a qualifying offer (Diamondbacks would get a compensation pick). If his performance fails to surge, my view is that the Diamondbacks cannot afford the risk of making him a qualifying offer that he accepts and instead he is a replacement level pitcher.

If I am Mike Hazen, I am listening to offers for anyone not under control beyond next season. However, just because I am listening, does not mean I will approve any deals. Frankly, the best trade chips the team had coming into this season were Naylor, Suarez, Gallen, Puk, and Kelly. Two of the five now have precious little trade value and Kelly is a better candidate for an extension than a trade.

If the team gets a big offer for one of the corner bats, I think the team should be accepting it. However, the key is that the return has to include needle-moving talent, preferably of the pitching variety. If the move is largely just about clearing salary and adding some lower-ceiling depth to the team, they might as well hold those two bats in case they can still make a late-season push.

If they want Kelly beyond this season, extend him now. Otherwise, trade him and don’t look back.

Gallen is much the same. They need to decide now if they are comfortable extending him a QO in the offseason (they should be in no-brainer fashion but this is Ken Kendrick we are talking about). If they are comfortable with that notion, then the only way Gallen moves is if another team is paying for a #2/3 starter. If teams are trying to trade for a 5.00 ERA pitcher to add depth to their rotation, they can look elsewhere. With Burnes unlikely to pitch in 2026 and Kelly potentially leaving, the team needs Gallen’s innings. If he accepts the QO, they have an extra season to fix the issue. If he doesn’t accept, then they have extra money and an extra selection in next season’s draft to help fix the issue. But all that distills down to the team needing to know what decision they are going to make about Gallen and the QO. If he isn’t getting one, they need to unload him for the best offer made and get some starting experience for one of the arms on the cusp of joining the rotation.

No, at least not on this year’s squad. Of the pending unrestricted free agents from this year’s roster, Gallen is the only one who I would hesitate on simply because he’s been so much worse that his trade value is probably at its very lowest. There’s certainly an argument to be made on whether or not he should be extended a qualifying offer, but I’m not sure what the marginal value of that hypothetical draft pick might be compared to what other teams are offering right now. Additionally, that assumes he gets a contract worth at least $50 million, which is certainly possible, but was a lot more likely before the season started than it does right now.

What other teams or storylines do you plan on following if/when you make the decision the Dbacks season is over?

Local teams in Ohio. Cubs for my aunts and uncles who are devoted to them. Seattle’s been a fav of mine for a while. Skenes and Skubal.

: Who said I was following the D’backs this year?? That’s a bit presumptuous. I’ll continue to barely watch the Dbacks and ignore the many many many boring monotonous moments of the baseball season and only start paying serious attention in September. In all seriousness, I’m paying attention to this year.

I love baseball so my interest isn’t limited to just the Diamondbacks. Despite the introduction of the DH, I am still a follower rather than American League, so that is my main focus. I dropped my MLB tv subscription and now I can only watch live free games. Those tend to start at Europe friendly hours, so that is what I am watching nowadays, apart from the Diamondbacks’ condensed games on MLB tv.

Probably not, tbh. I always say in times like this I’ll follow the Rays or something, but I never do. Dbacks games will just gradually have less of a marquee position in my living room until they’re just background noise.

: I generally lose interest during losing seasons sometime in early/mid September. I’m not really saying this is a losing season, but I am more referring to seasons where we are already 10 games out and 5 games under .500. There have definitely been bad seasons where it later occurs to me I didn’t watch a single game after X date. Once the last week of the season is in full swing and then the playoffs start I pay more attention again. Then I kind of switch to hockey mode.

I will continue to follow the Diamondbacks.

I’ll be following the Diamondbacks until the end, regardless of record. Beyond that, I’ll likely choose 5-10 players that I want to key in on and get a better feel for or simply watch because I think they are exciting. Mostly though, if the Diamondbacks fall into a tail-spin, my attention will largely shift to finding preseason friendlies to watch for the English Premier League. With Manchester United kicking off their season in mid-August, I’ll likely be slowly shifting to watching more footy than baseball anyway, at least on the weekends. If Arizona is out of contention, baseball could end up taking such a far backseat as to only be watched when I am at the pub.

If I was willing to watch, recap, and pay attention to the D-Backs when they were losing over 100 games back in 2021, a season that was derailed by an ungodly amount of injuries won’t stop me from doing those things. But I can already feel myself emotionally detaching from this year’s result and moving on to other things. Ironically, my other main team, the Orioles are experiencing an even more disappointing year and don’t have the same injury extent to use as an excuse. But I’m sure I’ll still follow them both until the bitter end - and probably a little after that too.

Another betting scandal, this time involving a player allegedly manipulating moments in the game. Is MLB doing enough to prevent a full on game throwing situation?

Having sports betting become closely intertwined with any professional sport is a mistake. You can’t watch any MLB related media without encountering an advertisement for some sports betting related company. MLB had once banned players for merely associating with known gamblers, and now you can find a sportsbook conveniently located in 14 out of the 30 ballparks. What Ortiz allegedly did is very different from the rest of the gambling suspensions of the last century (aside from Pete Rose), but it is very similar to what happened a little over a century ago in the 1910s to early 1920s. You know MLB had a problem when (at least) six players on the 1919 Chicago White Sox intentionally throw the World Series; and that doesn’t even get into less famous incidents like the NY Giants manager and one of his coach attempting to bribe a player on an opposing team to throw a game. It’s even easier to gamble now discretely and I’m not sure what, if anything else, that MLB can do to further discourage gambling and possible match fixing.

I think the situation is different here. In the other cases it was about players betting, but not on their own performance, and we had the Ohtani case, which was a bit different. In the case of it is about a player and the betting outcomes, not necessarily did he bet or did someone else bet for him. Those two pitches he threw were balls, no doubt about it. The second one might be the worst throw I have ever seen in the major leagues. On those throws people apparently betted heavily the outcome to be balls. There must be something in the footage where Ortiz signals somehow that he will throw a ball on the next pitch or maybe the one after it. Maybe Jomboy will be the first to discover it. But anyhow, this is the kind of situation where a is a no-doubter, because the player is . Apart from any possible legal consequences this might have.

: Yeah, this seems pretty egregious.

DBE is right, if it’s proven true, it’s a situation where you throw the book at him then salt the fields behind you. It’s what we’ve all been afraid was coming and knew was inevitable. But Manfred just had to get that sweet, sweet casino money.

By imposing penalties proportional to each situation, it sends a clear message that throwing a game (the ultimate bad) would result in the ultimate penalties. Their proportional responses should be enough to prevent games from being thrown.

I’m honestly a bit surprised it took this long for something like this to come up. Even before MLB partnered with various gambling sites to help get their finances healthy again, the abilities of modern technology to permit nuanced real-time gambling has paved the way for this sort of thing for years now. If MLB can find a smoking gun, then throw the book at him. Ban him for life, and claw back the entirety of his contract to the day he first was deemed to have allowed betting to “influence” the game. As far as whether or not MLB is doing enough to discourage this, I think as long as they are in bed with the sports betting industry, they are already at close to the maximum they can commit to. Either they are partners with the gambling industry, or they are not. The key is, if there is a suspected incident like this, that MLB act quickly and decisively and that any violations are adjudicated with extreme prejudice.

This was an inevitable conclusion to the, in my opinion egregious, coupling of the sport with gambling companies. There’s simply too much money at stake for this to not happen. Ironically, increasing player salaries would be one straightforward way to mitigate the risk and temptation of throwing a game - which would be one palatable way to distribute the gambling revenue the league continues to collect.

Any 4th of July traditions?

Given my career choice and specialties associated, I’ve worked in some capacity every July 4 since 2016. I enjoy doing so. It’s a fun holiday to work and generally people are in a good mood.

Trying to not die of heat stroke while making authentic hardwood charcoal fired BBQ. I’m not one of those who cheats and use a pellet smoker either, which means its 10x the work.

I would love to have one. I have some American friends here but they don’t gather and celebrate the 4th of July. I’d love to crash their party if they’d have one, although you can’t just launch fireworks here that day. On Thanksgiving day I celebrate with you and make a green bean casserole. I try to do my part!

That’s awesome DBE! Like Spencer, but for drastically different career choices, I usually work on the 4th too, but this year I got to go to Denver FanExpo and watch Denver’s firework show from my hotel room!

: That is pretty awesome DBE, I was kind of wondering what you and Theicon (I think that is the guy from UK?) do, if anything.

I wouldn’t necessarily call it a tradition, but my apartment is the last building in my complex overlooking a wash. For as long as I have lived here, over 10 years, I sit on my bed and watch the two fireworks displays I can see in the distance. One is the Marana fireworks show (5 miles away) and the other at a local high school (a little closer). I can also see the houses on the other side of the wash doing their own stuff.

Cook either grilled pizza or veggie burgers.

The holiday traditions have largely fallen by the wayside since I moved out of the Valley of the Sun. This year, I went to bed early, then had the temerity to be annoyed when fireworks woke me up just before 11:00. I guess about the only “tradition” left is that I still do burgers, brats, and dogs, complete with a massive collection of various accouterments (including copious amounts of bacon) to pair them with.

Ben: My parents and I didn’t have a ton of traditions when I was growing up besides going to the local parade and maybe watching the fireworks from their deck if the weather was clear. Now that I’m married, we go to my in-laws and go to a family friend’s house that’s right on the parade route for some drinks, food, and great conversation.