The Drive with Jody Oehler

The Drive with Jody Oehler

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It's Time For the Dbacks To Clean House

We interrupt this Suns playoff run to bring you an urgent bulletin from the Arizona Diamondbacks:

The Arizona Diamondbacks are really, really bad.

While baseball has its fair share of complex problems right now with watchability, cheating pitchers and losing generational fans, the Diamondbacks problems have a simple solution.

It’s time for a good ole fashioned house cleaning.

After the Diamondbacks lost their 18th game in a row on the road last night, Diamondbacks manager Torey Lovullo was praising their BASERUNNING.

That shouldn’t come as a surprise as Lovullo started the season by declaring a moral victory in a season opening loss to the San Diego Padres.

Lovullo is an extremely likable dude. Upbeat, approachable and relentlessly positive. He’s also the wrong person for this current Diamondbacks job. The Diamondbacks don’t need rainbows and sunshine during this embarrassing stretch, they need fire and brimstone.

He entered the season without a deal beyond 2021 so it wouldn’t be a surprise for the Dbacks to move on and my question is “What are they waiting for?”.

The Dbacks need a shockwave sent through their comatose roster.

This team is in dead last in the NL West. They’re objectively terrible. They’ve been terrible since collapsing in the final month of 2019. In fact, since September of 2019 the Diamondbacks are 60-88.

The house cleaning shouldn’t stop with an easy target like Lovullo. This current core of Dbacks players has overstayed their welcome.

David Peralta? He’s the player version of Lovullo. Everyone loves the Freight Train but his role with this team has evaporated due to their constant losing. Gone.

Eduardo Escobar? Should’ve been traded two years ago after knocking 35 bombs. Gone.

Nick Ahmed, Kole Calhoun, Josh Reddick? Gone, gone, gone.

I don’t care what they get in return, I’m tired of watching the same basic lineup fail over and over again.

To top it off, I would love to see Mike Hazen engage interested parties in Ketel Marte. Marte has been a monster and his contract is one of the best, most team friendly in baseball. But this is about maximizing the roster for 2023 and beyond. The price should be sky high but the Diamondbacks should at least be willing to see if teams are willing to meet it.

The only core pieces the Diamondbacks should hang on to are Zac Gallen, Carson Kelly, Pavin Smith and General Manager Mike Hazen. The rest of the roster isn’t exactly a gold mine for other teams but it could at least be a garage sale.

The Diamondbacks don’t have ready made replacements for the players they should be dealing. Their best prospects are a year or two away. I don’t care. I’m ready to turn the page to another version of the Diamondbacks. This current team and so many of its members are directly associated with losing and bottoming out. Its been a long time since Archie Bradley was racing around the bases for a triple in front of a raucous Wild Card crowd at Chase Field.

The only good news for the Diamondbacks is that their problem is mostly a major league talent issue, not an organizational leadership one. Mike Hazen and Derrick Hall remain the best choices for this franchise to entrust as its decision makers.

It's time to clean house, that might be the only win Dbacks fans can cheer for right now.


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