Arizona Diamondbacks: Robbie Ray continues to dominate

Lefty Robbie Ray of the Arizona Diamondbacks turned in one his strongest efforts of the season against the Dodgers on Wednesday.

Despite missing an important month of the season, left-hander Robbie Ray of the Arizona Diamondbacks appears as dominant now as he was earlier this season.

In his second start after falling subject to Major League Baseball’s concussion protocol, Ray completely shut down the dominating Los Angeles Dodgers, and served notice to opponents down the stretch that he clearly has  regained his form.

Pitching deep into the seventh inning during an eventual 6-4 victory over the Dodgers before 23,321 at Chase Field Wednesday night, Ray placed his traditional lethal fastball on both sides of the plate, and continuously kept the Dodgers off-balance with well-placed breaking pitches. Add his a newly-engineered rhythm and quicker pace, and Ray has maintained his spot among the elite pitchers for this season.

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Before the game, Dodgers’ manager Dave Roberts told Call to the Pen that Ray presents problems for his team, and added, “we have yet to figure him out.” The guessing continued Wednesday night and that’s when Ray went 6 2/3 strong innings, allowed four hits, one earned run (a home run from Curtis Granderson) and fanned 10 hitters. Ray reached double-digit in Ks for the seventh time this season, and 11^th time of his career.

Ray told Call to the Pen that overall there is nothing new in either his approach, his execution, nor his team’s demeanor.

“I felt everything was working well for me,” he said. “I wanted to get ahead of guys and keep attacking the zone. Plus, (catcher Chris Herrmann) called a really good game. Praise for him back there. For me, just felt like a normal game. Look, we know we can pitch and we know we can hit with any team in this league. We’re doing what we’re supposed to do in this clubhouse. That’s taking care of business every day.”

In this one, Ray was complemented by first baseman Paul Goldschmidt, who slammed a two-run homer in the first to ignite a three-run opening frame. For the fourth time in his career, the round-tripper was Goldschmidt’s third home run in as many games. After Herrmann added a third inning blast, Ray was on his way to his 11^th win, against five losses, on the season. More importantly, his ERA dropped to 2.97.

Oh, yes. Ray also chipped in with two singles, scored once, and reached base three times.

While pitchers like to bring their offense to the forefront, Ray’s effort showed little difference from the past number of outings. With his win over the Dodgers, Ray is 9-2 with a 2.22 ERA in his last 14 games. In that period, Ray recorded 101 strikeouts in 85.0 innings and opponents are hitting .183.

All of which caused Lovullo to point out the obvious to Call to the Pen.

“Robbie pitched into the seventh, gave us 100 pitches, one run and turned in a solid outing,” he said. “He just continues to be impressive.”

Next

The series concludes Thursday with a matinee contest. The Diamondbacks send Zack Greinke (15-6, 3.14 ERA) to the hill and will try for the sweep. The Dodgers, who have not been swept this season, will counter with Kenta Maeda (12-5, 3.76).

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Coming into Thursday’s game, the Dodgers have lost four straight for the first time this season and have back-to-back series losses for the first time since the opening weeks of the season. They dropped a series to the Rockies April 7-9, and also to the Cubs between April 10-13.