Sep 30, 2008 - 6:13 AM
0 shoutsBy Chris Bellamy PA SportsTicker Staff Writer
After one month, the superlatives and the hype were flying. Too bad May started.
The Arizona Diamondbacks were the best team in baseball through April. Brandon Webb was on his way to 30 wins and John McCain would get a free platform in his home state during the World Series - just in time for the election.
And then the rest of baseball dumped the Diamondbacks in a cold shower and they started a rapid descent into the middle of the pack.
When the air finally cleared - thanks to Manny Ramirez and the Los Angeles Dodgers fumigating the National League West in August and September - Arizona was back on the outside after claiming the division crown a season ago.
WHAT WENT WRONG?: When a team that was already near the top of the major leagues in strikeouts and near the bottom in batting average decides that Adam Dunn is the answer to its problems, something has gone awry.
It was that type of high-risk, high-reward player that got the Diamondbacks into their 2008 mess.
Talent isn't the issue here - Arizona has more than enough of that - but their lineup has been characterized as much by youth and inexperience.
With that youth came a lack of discipline and maturity.
Mark Reynolds led the club in RBI and homers, but set a new major league record with 204 strikeouts. Chris Young is among the league-leaders in extra-base hits but managed just 84 runs despite well over 600 at-bats.
Former first-overall draft pick Justin Upton exploded in April, then imploded the rest of the way and became a strikeout machine.
And then came the notorious all-or-nothing slugger Dunn, whom the Diamondbacks acquired in a trade with the Cincinnati Reds in August.
The move was likely a a knee-jerk reaction to the Dodgers' acquisition of Ramirez and the net result was an offense that, despite its potential, ranked in the bottom half in the majors in scoring.
As a whole, the team jumped out to a 20-8 start through the first month of the season -perhaps establishing unreasonable expectations. What happened when things got tougher is was an example of a team with long-term prospects roping itself into the idea that it has to win now or never.
MOST DISAPPOINTING PLAYER: Maybe it was the hamstring problems that bothered him throughout spring training or maybe it was the lucrative three-year deal he got at the tail end of a career season in 2007.
Either way, Eric Byrnes did not provide the punch at the top of the lineup that he did last season, when the Diamondbacks came out on top in the NL West. He went on the disabled list twice - the first two times in his career - before being shut down permanently with two torn hamstrings
He finished with a .209 average in 62 games and 23 RBI.
Adding insult to injury, it was signing Byrnes to an extension that made Carlos Quentin expendable and prompted Arizona to trade him in the offseason. Quentin hit 36 home runs and drove in 100 runs for the Chicago White Sox while posting a .396 on-base percentage - all marks that would have led the Diamondbacks.
BEST PLAYER: His streakiness may make fans anxious, but there is little doubt that Brandon Webb has emerged as one of baseball's best starting pitchers. After winning his first nine starts of the year, the former Cy Young Award winner hit a few slumps but still wound up as the National League's lone 20-game winner.
Webb finished 22-7 with a 3.30 ERA and 183 strikeouts while issuing just 65 walks and 13 homers in 226 2/3 innings.
REASON TO BELIEVE: The Diamondbacks' talent speaks for itself. Conor Jackson is a rising star, Byrnes should be back healthy next season, Stephen Drew has emerged as another solid bat and the team has a dynamic 1-2 punch at the top of its pitching rotation in Webb and Dan Haren.
Young and Upton are locked into the outfield for the foreseeable future and Chris Snyder and Miguel Montero give Arizona a solid young catching tandem.
FUTURE BRIGHTNESS: As if Webb and Haren weren't a good enough tandem already, the Diamondbacks expect big things out of another pair of righthanders - fireballers Max Scherzer and Jarrod Parker.
Scherzer, the 11th overall pick in 2006 out of Missouri, turned heads in his major league debut when he threw 4 1/3 no-hit innings in relief, striking out seven on April 29 against the Houston Astros. For the season, he averaged 10.61 strikeouts per nine innings in 56 frames.
Parker, the seventh overall pick in 2007 whose fastball has been clocked as high as 100 MPH, pitched for Class A South Bend this season and went 12-5 with a 3.44 ERA.
Arizona added a pair of lefthanders to its system in the first two rounds of the 2008 draft, grabbing Arizona State closer Daniel Schlereth and Southeast Louisiana starter Wade Miley.
