NL West

Take off the purple-colored glasses for a minute. Forget about the magic of 2009. Forget about the past for a moment.

The Rockies had climbed back into the game on Carlos Gonzalez's first career grand slam. With the score 8-6, Joe Beimel allowed Stephen Drew, a guy who seems to only hit against the Rockies, to hit a solo home run to right field to expand the lead to 9-6.

Anyone who follows baseball knows that if there ever was a must-win for the Colorado Rockies, Thursday was it.

When the Arizona Diamondbacks returned home from a disastrous road trip where they went just 2-8, there didn’t seem to be anything to look forward to for the final six home games of the season.

The Diamondbacks must have sensed the malaise of its fan base. The team took the 10-game road trip to do a little housekeeping at Chase Field to begin to build excitement to 2011 and especially the fact that Phoenix will be hosting the 2011 Major League Baseball All-Star game.

By the time the San Francisco Giants take the field in Colorado Friday night, there will be nine regular season games left.

I'm not sure there is anything regular about them. In these remaining games, the Giants will face the Colorado Rockies who are very much in the hunt AND the division leading San Diego Padres.

Through today (9/23), the Rockies are 3.0 games out of first place, and dropping three in a row to Los Angeles and Arizona.

The Giants and Rockies clash for three games over the weekend. If you are starting to see a trend here, you nailed it.

The State of the Union for the San Francisco Giants is slightly north of bleak.

With 10 games left in the pennant race, it looks like two, possibly three teams stand in the way of the Giants and their first playoff appearance since 2003.

What is probably closer to the truth, the Giants are also standing in their own way.

At various points throughout the 2010 season, we have already seen the "here today, gone tomorrow" offense, no matter who seemed to be in the lineup.

It is almost a daily topic now. Which Giants offense will show up?

The pitching has held up its end of the bargain and is pitching like a playoff team should. Not so much for the offense.

San Francisco has not allowed more than three runs in 16 straight games. This is tied for the fifth longest streak since 1900. They have thrown four shutouts during the streak.

In need of a general manager, the Arizona Diamondbacks went out and got someone who knows the National League West very well.

The Diamondbacks introduced former San Diego Padres’ GM Kevin Towers as their new GM and third full-time GM in their history on Wednesday. Towers replaces Jerry Dipoto, who was the interim GM.

This move represents another talent swap between the Diamondbacks and Padres.

Is Kelly Johnson a player who has turned a corner, becoming a must use fantasy option, or is a one-hit wonder, so to speak?  Before we can fully answer that question, let’s take a look at the numbers he’s put up this season (through Tuesday):

627 At Bats
.274 Batting Average (150 Hits)
23 Home Runs
65 RBI
86 Runs
11 Stolen Bases
.361 On Base Percentage
.484 Slugging Percentage
.323 Batting Average on Balls in Play

In the past couple weeks, baseball has begun to see its annual class of 20-game winners emerge. First was CC Sabathia, who will be going for win number 21 on Thursday. Second was Roy Halladay, who won his 20th game yesterday. Now, Jimenez is looking to win his 20th game.

The Arizona Diamondbacks have set a new record in a category to be embarrassed about, meanwhile introducing a new general manager.

The 2001 Milwaukee Brewers had set a record to forget about. They set the season strikeout record the year the Arizona Diamondbacks won the World Series.

Now, the Arizona Diamondbacks have broken the 1,399 strikeouts carried for several years with a standing season total of 1,403.

Just before packing it in at the end of the season, the final task for most players and coaches in Major League Baseball is to take a trip to the general manager's office—for, at the very least, the purpose of reviewing the performances of the previous year.

But rather than discussing the 2010 season, former batting coach Don Mattingly and GM Ned Colletti will be discussing the future.