World Series 2023: Christian Walker's baserunning miscue leaves Diamondbacks on the wrong side of pivotal momentum shift

PHOENIX — The Chase Field crowd stood and roared, early in the first World Series contest staged here since 2001, for the first baseman who entered the night batting .167 this postseason. In an echo of Phillies fans’ vocal encouragement of a struggling Trea Turner, the Arizona Diamondbacks’ fans threw their voices behind Christian Walker, one of the team’s longest-tenured players, as he led off the second inning in a scoreless Game 3 on Monday.

Texas Rangers starter Max Scherzer delivered a first-pitch fastball, and, lo and behold, Walker ripped a double, his first extra-base hit since NLCS Game 5 and only his fourth in Arizona’s 15 playoff games. Two pitches later — crack! — Tommy Pham sent a line drive searing over the infield toward Rangers right fielder Adolis García.

Walker hesitated, unsure if the frozen rope hit at 101.8 mph might hang up enough for García to run under it. Then, seeing that the ball would fall, he put his head down and set his course for home plate.

Even in the realm of high-stakes baseball whiplash, what happened in the rush of the next few seconds has to sting. Trying to make up for his slow read, Walker said afterward, he was focused on making a tight turn around third base — so focused that he missed it when third-base coach Tony Perezchica stopped waving and locked his arms into a stop sign.

García, one of the majors’ best throwing right fielders, fired a strike to home, and catcher Jonah Heim tagged Walker out easily. Instead of runners on the corners with nobody out, the Diamondbacks had Pham on second and one out, and they wound up going quietly.

In the very next frame, the Rangers tallied the only three runs they would need in the 3-1 victory on a Marcus Semien RBI single and a thunderous Corey Seager homer. In the process, Arizona’s chance to return home and seize a World Series advantage fell by the wayside.

“I feel like that was a huge momentum swing,” Diamondbacks manager Torey Lovullo said afterward. “You're looking at first and third, potentially, and no outs. And a lot of people like to play out the next set of circumstances — a pop-up and a ground ball off the pitcher's arm. But who knows? The timing, everything would have been different. We may have scored a bunch of runs. You just don't know what would have happened.“

Walker — the 32-year-old onetime journeyman who relentlessly proved himself to be a capable starter following the Paul Goldschmidt trade — took responsibility immediately, calling it an honest mistake.

“Probably just trying to do too much there,” he said. “Should have been more aware.”

Aggressive running, of course, has been a huge part of the Diamondbacks’ game this year. Supercharged by speed infusions from Corbin Carroll, Alek Thomas and others, Arizona stole 166 bases (second in MLB) with extreme efficiency (their 86% success rate was also second in MLB). And in the more fluid moments when aggression manifests, they were a top-five team at taking extra bases — such as scoring from second on a single, as Walker was trying to do.

Perezchica, the third-base coach who on this occasion tried to stop his runner, recently told Yahoo Sports’ Hannah Keyser that he has been sending more runners home this season. That probably got more runners thrown out, he conceded, but it also put more pressure on the defense and led to more runners scoring on close plays.

“That's kind of, like, the model of what we do now,” he said.

Undoubtedly, Walker expected to make a push for home. This season, 16 singles were hit with Walker on second. He scored 14 times and stayed at third only twice, a significant uptick from previous seasons, when it was something closer to a 50/50 proposition (even acknowledging the impossibility of comparing situations apples to apples).

Before the World Series began, Walker said the emphasis on running isn’t a conscious push so much as a part of the Diamondbacks’ identity, a “contagious” fervor that also inspired him to steal a career-high 11 bases without being caught.

“It's not like we go into the game, like, 'Hey, guys, you know, you got to remember, we gotta run fast today,'” he said prior to Game 1. “It's like, 'No, this is just who we are.' You can't slow us down.”

Except the Rangers did slow them down. Or perhaps the Diamondbacks slowed themselves down, slumping after Walker’s miscue and struggling to find another spark after Jon Gray entered for the Rangers to replace the injured Scherzer. Lovullo said his Diamondbacks felt flat for a few innings. By the time they mounted a push against the Texas bullpen, it was too late.

In one of the crueler twists of timing, Walker did look to be successfully turning a corner Monday. At the plate, his postseason slump showed signs of breaking, which could be a crucial development. He crushed 33 homers with a 123 OPS+ in the regular season as the most prolific run-producer in the middle of Arizona’s lineup. In Game 3, in addition to the ringing double, he had two other balls come off the bat at 95 mph or better, signaling a return to confident swings.

Reflecting on the loss that has his team down 2-1 in the World Series, Walker was thinking about the limits of effort, the limits of willpower in a game of timing and bounces and unforeseen situations.

“I think less is more for me,” he said. “You know, it's the World Series, and we want to win so bad, but still letting the game come to us — I think that's something that makes us dangerous.”

The Diamondbacks’ mantra — “embrace the chaos” — is mostly marketing, but it has felt particularly adept at describing Arizona’s breakneck speed and bracket-busting playoff performance. Walker understands why it might be misconstrued, why he might’ve misrepresented it for a split-second Monday, but he doesn’t want the confusion of one play to linger.

“You know, the chaos stuff, that implies playing with your hair on fire a little bit,” he said. “And I think that's a little misleading. I think we're really good at taking opportunities when they present themselves. And I think that's how we're going to win this.”