Thursday, August 07

Welcome to the D-backs Beat Newsletter! I’m Steve Gilbert and I’ve been writing about the D-backs since 1998. Let’s get right to it …

What a whirlwind couple of weeks it has been for Diamondbacks reliever Andrew Hoffmann.

On July 18, the right-hander was pitching for Triple-A Omaha when he was recalled by the Royals and joined them in Miami. He then went from there to Chicago to play the Cubs. In preparation for when the team would return, Hoffmann had his car shipped from Omaha to Kansas City.

But during the Cubs series, Hoffmann was optioned back to Omaha, which at the time was playing in Syracuse, N.Y. So off to upstate New York he went.

Four games into that series with Syracuse on July 26, Hoffmann was told he was traded to the Diamondbacks. But instead of joining them, he was told he was going to Triple-A Reno.

Reno at the time was in Las Vegas, but Hoffmann had to pack up the stuff he had already moved from Omaha to Kansas City. So he flew to K.C. to get his car off the tarmac, where it had been shipped after he got called up.

On July 29, two days after the trade, Hoffmann joined Reno in Las Vegas, and he shipped his car to Reno for when the Aces' road trip would end.

But Hoffmann never made it to Reno. On Monday, the Diamondbacks called him up to the big leagues. Hoffmann's car, however, remains in Reno for the time being.

“Just a ton of travel over the past week,” Hoffmann said.

“I'm super excited. ... After [GM] Mike [Hazen] called me on Saturday when I got traded, it was just initially, ‘Oh, I've got to move my life around now.’ And once you really settle in after a couple minutes, it's like a new opportunity. [I'm] excited to be here with all these guys and keep competing."

The Diamondbacks hope that Hoffmann’s travels are in the past, and that he will settle in and establish himself as a long-term solution in what has been a struggling bullpen. His first two appearances were a mixed bag, but if the way he pitched in his Arizona debut Monday is any indication, he might just do that.

Hoffmann got the final out of the sixth inning with two men on. He then retired the top of the Padres' lineup -- Fernando Tatis Jr., Luis Arraez and Manny Machado -- in order in the seventh.

“Nasty stuff,” two of Hoffmann’s teammates said unprompted to a reporter.

“A lot of swing and miss,” Diamondbacks manager Torey Lovullo said of what he saw in Hoffmann’s Arizona debut. “An aggressive fastball that was landing; the split with good arm speed looked like it was tunneling.

"The information that we had told us a story that gets about halfway to home plate and goes one direction or another, and that's hard to read. He made

some really good hitters swing and miss, and that's hard to do. But for me, the one thing that I loved when I handed him the baseball, it was the same conversation, the same look that I had in my office six or seven hours earlier. He was the same guy. I could tell that the heartbeat was right.”

In some ways, the trade to Arizona actually brought Hoffmann closer to home. After joining the Royals' organization, he and his fiancé moved to the Phoenix area and have been renting since. When Hoffmann let her know about the trade, she was excited.

So far, the Diamondbacks, too, are excited about how things have worked out.

Shortstop Geraldo Perdomo was named the Diamondbacks' Heart and Hustle Award winner as announced by the Major League Baseball Players Alumni Association.

The annual award is given to active players who exemplify a true passion for the game and who best embody the values, spirit and traditions of the game.

At the conclusion of the season, all alumni and fans will vote to select the final winner from the 30 team winners, and it will be announced in mid-November on MLB Network. No Diamondbacks player has ever won the overall award.

High-A Hillsboro catcher Kenny Castillo and Double-A Amarillo right-hander Jose Cabrera were named the organization’s Minor League Player and Pitcher of the Month for July.

Castillo hit .354 with a 1.022 OPS in 15 games for the Hops, including a six-game hitting streak from July 12-26.

Cabrera went 3-1 with a 2.56 ERA in six starts for the Sod Poodles while holding opponents to a .200 average and striking out 25. He led the Texas League in innings for the month with 31 2/3.

Saturday will be Star Wars Night at Chase Field, with the first 20,000 fans receiving a Corbin Carroll Rebel Pilot Bobble courtesy of Cox.

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