Arizona Diamondbacks climb Camelback Mountain

SCOTTSDALE, Ariz. — Everyone made it to the top. No one got hurt. A win for everyone according to Brad Ziegler.

Arizona Diamondbacks pitchers and catchers spent their Friday climbing Camelback Mountain.

“Everyone did pretty well,” Josh Collmenter said. “As a whole I think most of the guys are in shape to be able to do something like that. It was a good time for everybody, I think.”

The idea came from manager Kirk Gibson.

“Just something different,” Gibson said. “Go off site instead of being in the weight room. It’s just fun being with the guys, get off site, get out with the people.”

Gibson explained he wanted to give the pitchers a day off — but only from throwing. They still had to get in their conditioning work.

“It was challenging. Going up there, you got to concentrate. It’s rocky. It’s steep,” he said of the Echo Canyon trail. “It was a good workout, and it was good to do it together. Everybody did it. Nobody got hurt. Went up to the top, took a picture up there and made our way safely down.”

The key word there, safely. No one ran.

“(But) there was a girl that ran past us a couple of times, but other than that…” Ziegler said before laughing.

No, everyone went at their own pace. Everyone arrived at the top within 10 minutes of one another.

There was, however, an unscheduled break. The team had its hike momentarily halted by a mountain rescue.

“There was an airlift in front of us,” Gibson said. “Hopefully the guy is all right.”

The Diamondbacks are a week into workouts. Remember, they reported to camp early because of their scheduled trip to Australia next month.

Spring training is long enough — and for many too long — so players appreciated the change in routine.

“It’s good to have events like this,” Collmenter said. “You’re doing the same thing over and over. There’s only so many things you can do baseball-wise. Once you do them over and over and over again it kind of gets a little monotonous and boring, so just to keep guys focused and give them a break like this and then come back at everything tomorrow, I think it’s good overall for the team.”

And the lesson learned from the team-building exercise?

“Hopefully everybody just realizes that we’re all in this together,” Ziegler said. “If you decide you’re not going to put in the work, you’re going to be the only one doing it because everybody else will leave you behind. But no one wants to be that guy so everybody puts in the work.”

At the top of Camelback Mountain @dbacks #gargoyling pic.twitter.com/qcV5qUGGGu

— Brad Ziegler (@BradZiegler) February 14, 2014

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