Dose of Venom: Miley, Trumbo headline D-backs’ spoil job vs. Giants

PHOENIX — Wade Miley and Mark Trumbo were in cahoots Monday at Chase Field, spearheading the Arizona Diamondbacks’ plot to spoil the San Francisco Giants’ run at the division pennant.

Manager Kirk Gibson and the D-backs were the beneficiaries of the best start of the season for Miley and a timely slump-breaking home run from Trumbo, whose third-inning grand slam set the tone in Arizona’s 6-2 win.

After lasting just 2.0 innings in his last start against the Giants — a 5-1 loss — Miley impressed Monday, tossing 7.0 scoreless innings while scattering seven hits and allowing just one run. The start was a return to normal for the left-hander, who had a 2.20 ERA in five starts preceding his Sept. 9 blip in San Francisco.

“You’ve got to put that start behind (you), and I think I did that,” Miley said after the game. “Those are going to happen and you’ve just got to make some adjustments in between and go from there.”

After his struggles in his previous outing, Gibson said Miley tweaked his game on Monday.

“Oh, he was throwing 93, 94, 95 — he just got frustrated,” the manager said. “He was throwing hard. You know, he was yanking balls and he was unable to make an adjustment.

“Today, he got out there and got settled in really nice, so I know he’s worked on some things. You know — things go wrong out there, how do you fix them? He has great stuff; we all know that. But to get to the next level, that’s one thing he’ll have to figure out.”

Opposite Miley was Giants right-hander Ryan Vogelsong, whose third-inning mistakes cost him an otherwise decent performance against the team he dominated in San Francisco (6.2 scoreless innings) on Wednesday.

The D-backs put together a two-out rally with a man on first base in Vogelsong’s sour frame. Chris Owings singled up the middle and A.J. Pollock coaxed an eight-pitch walk to load the bases for Trumbo, who stepped into the batter’s box in the midst of a 120-at-bat home-run drought.

The cleanup man rid the basepaths of runners by bludgeoning a hanging slider over the fence near the pool area in right-center field for his second career grand slam.

In the seventh inning, Pollock and Trumbo would again team up to put runs on the board for the D-backs. The center fielder drove in pinch-hitter Cliff Pennington with his only hit of the game — a triple to the left-center field gap. Then, Trumbo’s up-the-middle single plated Pollock, giving the first baseman his fifth RBI of the contest — the second-most in any single game of his career.

In the top half of that inning, the Giants manufactured their first run off of Miley, thanks in part to a misplay by Aaron Hill at third base. They’d tally another off of relief pitcher Joe Paterson in the following frame, but Eury De La Rosa closed out the four-run lead in the ninth inning, allowing just a bloop single while retiring the Giants’ side to please most of the 21,731 in attendance.

The Good:

Pollock has been pretty crisp in 11 games since spending three months on the shelf with a broken hand. The 26-year-old, who boasted a .316 batting average at the time of the injury, has hit .289 with a .357 on-base percentage after being activated earlier this month. He has added seven RBI, seven runs scored, four stolen bases and four walks to that effort.

The Bad:

Though again playing an impeccable shortstop for Miley and the D-backs, Didi Gregorius remained flummoxed at the plate, going 0-for-4 with a pair of strikeouts to lengthen the slump he’s been caught in since Aug. 1. Gregorius is hitting just .153 since that date while striking out 24 times in 111 at-bats.

He Said It:

“Lately, I’ve been trying to hit the ball in the air more. There’s not a ton of money for me on the ground, figuratively. I don’t have the speed to beat those balls out. I’m a guy who needs to set my sights a little higher — try to shoot those gaps, and if they do go out of the park, it’s all the better.” -D-backs first baseman Mark Trumbo

Up Next:

Two of the hottest pitchers in the NL West are slated to climb the Chase Field mound Tuesday. The D-backs will look to Josh Collmenter to win their second consecutive series, while the Giants will lean on Jake Peavy to get their postseason pursuit back on track.

In 27.2 innings spread out over his last four starts, Collmenter has managed a microscopic 0.65 ERA, improving his mark on the season to 3.67 to go with a 10-7 record.

Peavy’s impressive stretch has spanned longer, as the right-hander is 5-1 with a 1.12 ERA over his last six starts. Since the Giants acquired him from the Boston Red Sox at the trade deadline, Peavy has a 2.28 ERA in nine starts.
First pitch is scheduled for 6:40 p.m. and can be heard on Arizona Sports 98.7 FM.