The NL West second place Arizona Diamondbacks take their hot play to Houston to face the 19-31 Astros. The D-backs have struggled at times against teams with poor records and especially on the road can be very shaky. As exciting as their current streak of 11-of-13 wins on the line in a three-game weekend series.
The D-backs will start things off with Dan Hudson who has seemingly solved his first inning struggles with an adjustments to his pregame routine. Huddy is 4-1 with a 2.27 ERA in his last five starts. He faces Astros' righty Bret Meyers (1-4, 5.00).
Zach Duke will get his first start of the season. He broke his hand during spring training and will finally get to take the mound for the club after a couple of rehab starts in the minors. Duke will take on Wandy Rodriguez (3-3, 3.41) in Game 2. Game 3 will feature Josh Collmenter (3-1, 1.19) and Bud Norris (2-3, 3.77). It will be interesting to see how Collmenter bounces back from his first bad outing of the season in his last start.
The game starts Friday at 5:05 p.m. on Fox Sports Arizona with the live game thread at AZ Snake Pit.
Series Preview #18: Arizona Diamondbacks vs. Houston Astros - AZ Snake Pit
In a way, the Astros sort of resemble the D-Backs' weird, kinda cool cousin to the East. You know, the cousin who you go on a family vacation to visit once a year, realize "Hey, we actually have a lot in common, we should hang out more" before you leave and promptly forget about them for another year? The family resemblance between the Diamondbacks and Astros is uncanny. Both teams are from major Sunbelt cities with red uniforms and a stadium with a retractable roof.Diamondbacks Farm Round-Up: May 26th - AZ Snake Pit
Just about every fifth day on the farm this year, we've treated to seeing the awesome prospect triumvirate of Jarrod Parker, Tyler Skaggs, and J.R. Bradley throwing on the same day. Clearly, this is some sort of sinister plot by the organization to kill precisely 1/5 of my social life by having me obsessively following minor-league Gameday and box scores for five hours (due to the time delay from Visalia to South Bend).
Snakelet of the Day: Tyler Skaggs (Hi-A): 7 IP, 4 H, 1 R (1 ER), 11:1 K:BB, 1 HR, 7:2 GO:FO