Mike Hazen: "The Goalposts Have Moved"

During spring training this past February Mike Hazen was asked what would define a successful season for the 2023 Diamondbacks. He responded that being buyers at the trade deadline and playing meaningful games in September would make the season successful in his mind.

Coming off a 74 win season in 2022, and a disastrous 52-110 loss season in 2021, those seemed like reasonable goals. They were enough of a stretch to be ambitious, but not unrealistic. As the entire baseball world knows by now, not only did they achieve those goals easily, but blew past any conceivable level of success at the time by not only making the playoffs as the third Wild Card team, but reaching the 2023 World Series, which they lost to Texas Rangers four games to one. 

Asked if reaching the World Series this year raises the bar and moves the goalposts when it comes to goal setting, Hazen was direct and to the point:

"Completely. Yes the goalposts have moved, as they should. Yes!  I feel like part of my responsibilities is to set realistic expectations for what we're shooting for. I don't see any reason why that's not a realistic expectation moving into next year with the team we're going to have coming back."

Hazen also stated back in spring that improvement and growth from young players would fuel the team wide improvements expected for 2023. That happened in spades. Corbin Carroll had one of the better rookie seasons in recent memory and show win the Rookie of the Year award. Gabriel Moreno developed into a star over the second half of the season and into the playoffs as a premium defensive catcher who can hit and hit for power.  Geraldo Perdomo had a fabulous first half at the plate, making the All-Star team, and played excellent defense all year. Alek Thomas is a finalist for the NL Gold Glove in centerfield, and starred in the postseason with clutch homers and even multiple base hits off left-handed pitching. Brandon Pfaadt turned his season around after a rocky start to become a postseason pitching sensation. 

There were veteran performances that met expectations too.  Ketel Marte had a bounce back season and set a major league record 20 game postseason hit streak mark. Christian Walker essentially repeated his career year from 2022, and of course Zac Gallen and Merrill Kelly formed a one-two punch at the top of the rotation that was as good as any in the game.  These core players, both youngsters and veterans,  will all be back next year. 

Hazen expects even further improvement from the young core. Younger players tend to get better with experience, and the experience gained this postseason has been invaluable.  He pointed out for example that Carroll got to play in 17 games and took 78 postseason at bats against some of the best pitching  in baseball under constant high pressure situations.  That can only make him a better player. 

Add to that the team had an improved bullpen late in the year with the addition of Paul Sewald helping stabilize roles. Hazen expects to build on that bullpen core during the off season and avoid many of the 8th and 9th inning losses the team suffered over the first 4+ months. 

The one regret Hazen expressed, and took full accountability for was the failure to acquire a starting pitcher at the trade deadline, leaving Torey Lovullo without a reliable fourth starter to use in the playoffs. That resulted in having to go with two bullpen games, one in the NLCS and one in the World Series. The first one was successful, but the second one blew up as the Rangers scored 10 runs through three innings, effectively ending that game. 

"I have a lot of regrets. It's kinda painful to sit here and talk about this after getting bounced from the World Series and feeling like what happened in Game 4 isn't 100% on me."

Despite that he defended his trade deadline moves. He did add players, including Sewald, Tommy Pham, who became an integral piece of the lineup, and Jace Peterson. He made it clear that they looked at every possible starter on the market, but the cost to acquire starting pitching was extremely high.  Many of those discussions started with Alek Thomas. Even beyond Thomas it sounded like the asking prices would have stripped the system of some of their top rated players. 

You make the decisions you make. We added at the deadline. It wasn't like we just sat there with our thumbs and didn't do anything. But we didn't do enough........thats a tough one for me to swallow right now. 

Hazen made clear in today's press conference that acquiring experienced, reliable starting pitching is the number one priority for this offseason. Between trade opportunities and free agency, there will be a large market, and hopefully he can do better at that then he did last offseason when his starting pitching move was to bring back Zach Davies. 

He also acknowledged that he will be in need of finding another right hand bat or two. Lourdes Gurriel Jr, Tommy Pham, and Evan Longoria are all free agents. 

Meeting the raised bar goal of getting to the postseason will require further growth from the core youth on the team, continued performance from the holdover veterans, and additions in the areas of starting pitching and right handed bats. 

Stay tuned with Inside the Diamondbacks as we track the team's offseason progress in achieving these goals. In the meantime you can listen to the entire unedited 30 minute sound clip of Hazen's press conference at the sound cloud link below.