subject: Arizona Diamondbacks Tickets : The D-backs Becomes The Fastest Expansion Team To Win A Championship [print this page] The Arizona Diamondbacks are a professional baseball team based in Phoenix, Arizona. They play in the West Division of Major League Baseball's National League. From 1998 to the present, they have played in Chase Field .
Also known as the D-backs, Arizona has one World Series title, in 2001, becoming the fastest expansion team in the majors to win a championship, doing it in only the fourth season since their expansion in 1998.
On May 8, after going 12-17 in 29 games, the Diamondbacks let manager Bob Melvin go and hired A. J. Hinch. The season ended with the Diamondbacks in last place and a record of 70 wins and 92 losses .They played almost as well on the road as they did at home, going 34-47 on the road, while finishing 36-45 at home. The Diamondbacks' tough year was blamed on a struggling offense (who had a collective .224 batting average), and even more so on an inadequate pitching staff, which had a collective ERA of 4.18.
The Diamondbacks continued to struggle during the 2010 season, ending the season with a 65-97 record in the basement of the NL West. On July 1, general manager Josh Byrnes and manager A. J. Hinch were fired and replaced on an interim basis by Jerry Dipoto and Kirk Gibson respectively.
The Diamondbacks set a new MLB record for strikeouts in a season, breaking the record on September 21 and ending the season with 1,529. A significant weakness on the 2010 club was the bullpen, which finished with a collective 5.47 ERA.
The Diamondbacks announced in July 2007 that for the 2008 season, all regionally broadcast Diamondback TV games will be shown exclusively on FSN Arizona; and a few could possibly be shown on the national MLB on Fox telecasts. FSN Arizona is currently seen in 2.8 million households in Arizona & New Mexico. The previous flagship station, since the inaugural 1998 season, was KTVK, a popular over-the-air independent station in Phoenix.
On August 11, 2008, Dallas Buck, RHP Micah Owings, and C Wilkin Castillo were traded to the Reds (in last place in the NL Central at the time) in exchange for OF Adam Dunn. Dunn, who was tied for the major league lead with 32 home runs, was expected to provide a significant boost to an offense that has struggled to score runs for most of the season. Dunn seemed quite positive about being traded to a ballclub in first place in its division in August.
The move was seen by some fans as a belated attempt by the D-Backs to counter the trade by their division rival, the Los Angeles Dodgers, for Boston Red Sox power-hitting OF Manny Ramirez on July 31 and also to compensate for the injuries to Hudson and Byrnes, generally considered two of the more "power-hitting" Diamondbacks on a team which has relied heavily on pitching and defense in recent years.
A free agent at the end of the season, on February 11, 2009, Dunn agreed to a two-year $20 million contract with the Washington Nationals.Owings, once considered an excellent pitching prospect for the Diamondbacks, struggled in the 2008 campaign with a 7.09 ERA after April 21.
On August 31, the Diamondbacks acquired former World Series MVP David Eckstein to fill the hole at secondbase which was opened after Orlando Hudson was placed on the disabled list. Eckstein was traded from the Toronto Blue Jays for Minor League pitcher Chad Beck.
After a less successful last half of the season, they finished with a record of 82/80 which dethroned them of the NL West Champions sitting them at 2nd place behind the Los Angeles Dodgers.In 2009, Mark Grace and Darron Sutton are still tagged as the main broadcasters of the Diamondbacks. However, for pre-game and post-game shows on Fox Sports Arizona, former.
On June 23, 2010, the Diamondbacks announced that the team would retire its first jersey number by honoring Luis Gonzalez. Gonzalez played with the Diamondbacks for eight seasons, 1999 to 2006, and attended five All-Star games representing the team.
His number, 20, was retired in a pre-game ceremony which was held at Chase Field on August 7, 2010 in front of a sellout crowd of 48,946. After the ceremony, the Diamondbacks won the game against the San Diego Padres 6-5 after a walk-off home run by Chris Young.
