Bumgarner and the Diamondbacks Take on the Marlins

The Diamondbacks are on the road and play the Miami Marlins today at 3:40 P.M. MST, 6:40 P.M. EST.

Television:

D-backs - Bally Sports Arizona

Marlins - Bally Sports Florida

Radio:

D-backs - ESPN Phoenix 620, KHOV Univision 105.1 (Spanish)

Marlins - FOX Sports 940AM (WINZ), WAQI 710 (Spanish)

Records:

The D-backs are 8-5 and hold a one game lead over the San Diego Padres in the NL West.

The Marlins are 6-7, and are in third place in the NL East, three games behind Atlanta

Pitching Matchup

Madison Bumgarner, LHP, 0-1, 7.27 ERA, 8.2 IP

Bumgarner will make his third start of the year. He battled through 4 2/3 innings in his last start, giving up three runs, two earned, despite walking six batters and allowing two home runs.

Since July 15th of last year Bumgarner has been one of the worst starting pitchers in MLB, allowing the fourth highest ERA since that date, (6.63) and third highest wOBA (weighted on base average) against, .394. (Min. 50 IP)

Presumed by many to be on a short leash to start the season, the team may have little choice but to be patient and stick with him a while longer. Zach Davies hit the injured list with an oblique strain and the Diamondbacks already have two rookie starters in the rotation, (Ryne Nelson and Drey Jameson). Mike Hazen has spoken in the past about not wanting to be overly reliant on rookies in the rotation, but if Bumgarner is not able to turn things around, he may have little choice but to replace him in the rotation with one of Tommy Henry or Brandon Pfaadt.

Trevor Rogers, LHP. 0-2, 6.00 ERA, 9 IP

Rogers is also making his third start. After a spectacular rookie season in which he posted a 2.64 ERA in 133 innings, finishing second in the Rookie of the Year voting, Rogers has struggled. Last year made 23 starts, and posted a 5.07 ERA in 107 innings, and this year has started out much like last year.

Rogers throws a four seam, change up, and slider, and this year he has added a sinker. He's is getting above average movement on the sinker and it's been one of his more effective pitches, although he's using it just 15% of the time so far. His four seam velocity has averaged 93.6 MPH on the fastball, which is about one MPH less than last year.

LINEUPS

Luis Arraez, who leads MLB in batting average and OBP is not in the lineup as Miami is going with an all right handed lineup today.

The Marlins have a .790 OPS against left hand starting pitchers, which ranks 8th in MLB. The D-backs .658 OPS against southpaw starters ranks 20th. Current D-backs hitters don't have a lot of track record against Rogers, but Christian Walker had a homer against him last year.

Red hot Josh Rojas gets the start at DH today. He had his fourth 3-hit game of the year on Wednesday's getaway game. Slumping Jake McCarthy in on the bench.