Robbie Ray struggles again in loss

With Madison Bumgarner continuing to work his way back from a back injury, Ray’s prolonged struggles again raised questions about how long the Diamondbacks can wait before looking elsewhere, particularly when they have a pitcher in Alex Young who has thus far been perfectly capable of turning in competitive starts.

Ray, however, seems always capable of finding positives, always suggesting he is close to rounding into form. For him, the focus was on the feel he gained for his curveball the second time through the order and on the fact that his walks were “mostly” the result of “noncompetitive 3-2 pitches.”

He was able to work out of basesloaded jams in each of the first two innings, situations built, in part, on bases on balls. He pitched similarly five days earlier, issuing six walks against the San Diego Padres but somehow allowing just one run.

That luck started to catch up with him in the middle innings on Friday. After a one-out walk to Wilmer Flores in the third, he left a fastball up and over the plate that Evan Longoria crushed for a two-run shot. Two innings later, after a walk to Mike Yastrzemski, Wilmer Flores lined a first-pitch fastball out to left for another two-run shot. The Giants won 6-2.

Ray’s final line was not a thing of beauty – it included seven hits, four runs, five walks and a wild pitch – but catcher Stephen Vogt thought it did not fully capture the performance.

“Obviously, giving away the free passes, we want him to stay out of that,” Vogt said. “But the jams he was able to get out of in the first and second innings was incredible. You tip your cap to him for making pitches when he needed to and getting us out of trouble. I thought he was really, really good out there today.”

At the start of camp, Ray did not deny how important this year was for him personally. He dropped weight in the winter and reworked his arm swing and his delivery, all in hopes of hitting free agency in the best position possible. It has not worked out – in fact, he has abandoned some of those mechanical changes -- but he said free agency hasn’t weighed on him or played into his performance.

“It’s something that I feel like I do a good job of is blocking out the noise,” Ray said. “It’s not something I’m really thinking about.”

The Diamondbacks scored their two runs in the fourth on consecutive hits by Christian Walker (double), David Peralta (double) and Eduardo Escobar (single).