Diamondbacks failing to stave off elimination, get crushed by Yankees

PHOENIX — Five of the first six Yankees hitters on Friday scored at Chase Field, as New York blew out an Arizona Diamondbacks team desperate for a win, 9-2.

The Diamondbacks fell to five games back of the third National League Wild Card spot at 80-74. The San Diego Padres cruised to an 8-2 win over the Miami Marlins, tying the Chicago Cubs and Philadelphia Phillies in the Wild Card standings.

Arizona has lost three in a row and is 2-5 to start its pivotal final homestand, and its playoff odds have dropped to 5.1% on FanGraphs.

There are eight games left in the regular season, and the D-backs need to make up ground on San Diego quickly just to have a chance to sweep the Padres at Petco Park in the last series next weekend.

That concluding series being against the Padres is perhaps the final lifeline the D-backs have (barring a complete collapse from Philadelphia or Chicago) but they need to be two games better than San Diego over the next five to set up a Hail Mary:

• Padres go 0-5, D-backs have to go 2-3 or better
• Padres go 1-4, D-backs have to go 3-2 or better
• Padres go 2-3, D-backs have to go 4-1 or better
• Padres go 3-2, D-backs have to go 5-0
• Padres go 4-1 or better, ballgame

“We got eight games left and all we can do is try to win all eight games and go out and compete like we’ve done all year,” outfielder Tim Tawa said. “Baseball’s a tough sport sometimes, things just don’t go your way. We all want it really bad in here, we all want to win.”

“Until there’s that little ‘E’ next to our name, I’m going to say we’ve got time and we can do anything we want,” manager Torey Lovullo said. “We’ve just got to play our game, first and foremost. That’s step one, play our game, do what we do best and then see what happens.”

The Diamondbacks rearranged their starting rotation to get All-Star Eduardo Rodriguez on the hill for the opener against New York.

Rodriguez has had a fantastic season, but his one issue has been getting through the first inning unscathed.

He had given up first-inning runs in three straight starts before Friday’s game, when he simply did not have control early. Rodriguez walked three of the first four batters, one with the bases loaded and no outs. A George Lombard Jr. two-run single broke the game open with one out, and it took Rodriguez 45 pitches to get the first three outs.

Rodriguez retired 15 of the next 18 hitters, but the damage had been done. An offense that has been unreliable lately was handed a five-run hole right away.

In his last home start of a brilliant 2026 season, Rodriguez walked off the mound having given up seven earned runs and hearing “Let’s go Yankees” chants.

“It’s something that I need to work on because the command is there, it’s just in that first inning that it’s always off,” Rodriguez said. “But after that, the results are good, so it’s something to work on.”

Arizona’s situation did not improve when Zac Gallen made his relief debut in the seventh. Two walks and two throwing errors — one from third baseman Nolan Arenado and the other first baseman Pavin Smith on a flip — cost the D-backs two more runs. Gallen ended up throwing three innings with one earned run in what could have been his final appearance at Chase Field as a member of the Diamondbacks.

The game was mostly uncompetitive, and the D-backs not at the very least playing a clean game to keep it close was disappointing for a team that needs to fight to survive.

“That bothers me a lot,” Lovullo said.

The one point in this game when the tide looked like it could turn was the second inning, when Corbin Carroll hit a two-run home run off Yankees starter Gerrit Cole.

Carroll had been struggling, 0-for-8 since his walk-off home run on Monday struggling. The Diamondbacks moved him down to seventh in the lineup, pushing Smith up to fifth.

Carroll hit a home run and a double from his new spot, while Smith went 0-for-2 with a strikeout.

The Yankees struck back with a Ben Rice home run off Rodriguez in the third inning to quickly quell any momentum Arizona built.

That was mostly it from the D-backs’ offense, as all three phases of this game were subpar. The top three of Lars Nootbaar, Ketel Marte and Gabriel Moreno went 0-for-12. Marte is batting .185 over the last six games.

The 25th anniversary celebration of the 2001 World Series is Saturday. That team needed to win two games against the Yankees at home to accomplish the ultimate goal.

These Diamondbacks are not those Diamondbacks, but the 2026 team has had a tendency to avoid prolonged skids (or sustain winning stretches).

“Right now, we just need to win every game,” Rodriguez said.

A problem is that the Diamondbacks will face American League Cy Young favorite Cam Schlittler on Saturday.

In the words of C3PO, “It would take a miracle to save us now.”

Friday attendance

41,910

Saturday starters

RHP Brandon Pfaadt (7-3, 3.77) vs. RHP Cam Schlittler (14-6, 1.95)

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