November 2, 2026
November 2, 2026
Arizona Diamondbacks 2026: Eighty-Six Wins and One Weekend Short
The Diamondbacks’ 2026 season was a story of resilience that ran out of road. Arizona won 86 games, finished 10 games above .500 and led the majors with 47 comeback victories. Yet the club watched its postseason hopes die on the final Sunday at Petco Park. For the third straight year since the 2023 World Series run, October belonged to someone else.
General manager Mike Hazen spent the offseason chasing value rather than headlines. His boldest move came on January 13, when Arizona acquired Nolan Arenado from St. Louis for pitching prospect Jack Martinez. The Cardinals sent $31 million along with the veteran third baseman, making the gamble nearly risk-free.
Hazen also kept Merrill Kelly with a two-year, $40 million deal and added Michael Soroka on a one-year, $7.5 million contract. The bullpen, a bottom-five unit in each of the previous two years, received Taylor Clarke and Jonathan Loáisiga. Preseason projections gave Arizona roughly a 40 percent chance of reaching the playoffs. Manager Torey Lovullo entered his tenth season in the dugout without a contract for 2027, which raised the stakes from the first pitch.
The farm system also pushed fresh talent toward Chase Field. Eight players made their major league debuts during the year, including Ryan Waldschmidt, Tommy Troy and LuJames Groover. That youth movement gave the Diamondbacks’ 2026 season a dual identity. The front office wanted to contend now while still building a pipeline for the years ahead.
The opening weekend delivered an immediate test. Arizona was swept in three games at Dodger Stadium and limped home 0-3. The response came quickly. On March 30, the Diamondbacks clawed past Detroit 9-6 for their first victory.
One night later, rookie José Fernández announced himself by homering twice in his major league debut against the Tigers. Those blasts powered another comeback and set the tone for a club that would refuse to stay down all year. Arizona went 16-14 through March and April, then traveled to Mexico City in late April. After dropping the opener to San Diego at Estadio Alfredo Harp Helú, the Diamondbacks answered with a 12-7 rout.
May brought a pair of five-game winning streaks and real momentum. Arizona hit .294 with runners in scoring position as of May 25, the best mark in baseball. Then the clutch hitting unraveled. Within a month, that figure had slid to .243, and a 12-15 June dragged the club back toward mediocrity.
The Diamondbacks reached the halfway mark at 41-40, sitting 10.5 games behind the Dodgers. The rotation was the core problem. Zac Gallen, Kelly and Brandon Pfaadt all carried ERAs above 5.70 at that point. Injuries to Ryne Nelson and Soroka thinned the depth further. Pfaadt was sent to Triple-A Reno to reset, and that demotion proved to be one of the smartest decisions of the year.
If one player carried the Diamondbacks’ 2026 season, it was Gabriel Moreno. The catcher hit .311 with a .388 on-base percentage and an .874 OPS, all career highs. His average led the National League and gave Arizona its first batting title in franchise history.
Moreno also set career bests with 33 doubles, 16 home runs and 83 RBI across 130 games. He hit .343 with men on base, delivering exactly the situational production the lineup lacked elsewhere. Behind the plate, he added 14 Defensive Runs Saved. His full numbers on Baseball Reference tell the story of a player who finally seized his potential.
Eduardo Rodríguez arrived in 2026 with two straight seasons of ERAs above 5.00. He left it as the unquestioned leader of the staff. The left-hander won 16 games with a 2.89 ERA, anchoring a rotation that badly needed stability.
Soroka supported him with a 3.41 ERA over 116 innings, his heaviest workload since 2019. Pfaadt returned from Reno transformed, posting a 1.88 ERA in July and finishing with a career-best 3.77 mark. The rebuilt bullpen held its end as well. Juan Morillo and Brandyn Garcia both dominated, and the relief corps ranked fourth in baseball in Win Probability Added.
Arenado justified every dollar the Cardinals did not ask Arizona to pay. He hit 30 home runs, leading the team and topping his previous two seasons combined. His .806 OPS was his best since 2022.
Corbin Carroll endured an uneven campaign but still produced value in every phase. He led the majors with 17 triples, set the franchise career triples record and posted 22 home runs. A deeper look at Carroll’s numbers shows elite baserunning and Gold Glove-finalist defense masking a .202 average after July. Geraldo Perdomo and Ketel Marte, however, never recaptured their 2025 form. Marte also drew weeks of unwanted headlines in August after missing a game without notifying the club.
Arizona held a playoff position as recently as September 8. That same day, Corbin Burnes made his long-awaited return from Tommy John surgery. It should have been the jolt that carried the club home. Instead, the Diamondbacks lost six of their next eight games and fell four games behind Philadelphia for the final wild-card spot.
Injuries had already drained the pitching staff. A.J. Puk never threw a pitch for Arizona after a setback in his recovery. Hard-throwing reliever Justin Martinez missed much of the year. Hazen later admitted that the lack of moves at the trade deadline left the roster short.
Still, this team refused to fold. A weekend series against the Yankees brought a Pavin Smith walk-off homer and a go-ahead grand slam from Arenado. Arenado then put together a final week with an OPS above 1.400 and earned NL Player of the Week honors. Was there one more comeback left in a club that had authored 47 of them?
The answer came at Petco Park. Burnes was scratched from his Saturday start with a recurring shoulder issue, forcing Lovullo into a bullpen game. The Padres seized a 10-7 victory, and the loss left Arizona needing a win and a Phillies loss on Sunday.
Neither arrived. Philadelphia jumped ahead of Tampa Bay early and cruised 7-3. Moments later, San Diego finished off a 9-4 win over the Diamondbacks on September 28. The MLB.com account of the elimination captured a clubhouse that understood how narrow the margins had been. Carroll put it plainly, saying the team needed to play better over the full 162 games.
The Diamondbacks’ 2026 season will be remembered for what it built and what it squandered. Moreno became a franchise cornerstone with a historic batting title. Rodríguez rediscovered his best form, and Arenado proved he still had thunder in his bat. The bullpen, long a weakness, became a weapon.
Yet the final standings carry a harder truth. Arizona has won 89, 80 and 86 games in the three seasons since its pennant, with no postseason appearance to show for any of them. The closing weekend in San Diego mirrored 2025, when the club also stumbled against the Padres at the finish. In 2024, the Diamondbacks were edged out on a tiebreaker after winning 89 games. Three straight near misses have turned September into a source of dread for the fanbase.
The core questions are now clear. The rotation needs a healthy Burnes, and the lineup needs Marte and Perdomo to rediscover their best form. The club also needs more timely hitting than it produced after May.
Ownership chose continuity. On October 2, the club signed Lovullo to a two-year extension, aligning his deal with Hazen’s remaining term. The broader record of the campaign lives on the 2026 Arizona Diamondbacks season page, but the lesson for Arizona is simple. Resilience won the club 86 games. Finishing is what will carry it back to October.
7th February, 2017
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