It's been over five months since I last posted a team set from the 2013 SEGA Card Gen set, finishing out the AL teams with the Toronto Blue Jays. These posts are time-consuming and labor-intensive to write, but I do enjoy seeing what each player has been up to since these came out in 2013. Today we start out in the NL with the Arizona Diamondbacks. The average number of cards per team in this set is 13, but the Diamondbacks got 16 cards on the checklist. They got at least one player for each fielding position, as well as a decent complement of players in the rotation and bullpen.
As usual, the team starts off with the catcher position. This card came out after the 2012 season, which was the last in a pretty good four-year run for Montero, with an All-Star appearance in 2011 and a couple of MVP votes in 2011 and 2012. His performance has tailed off a bit since then, although he was an All-Star again in 2014. He joined the Cubs for the 2015 season and is currently a little banged up.
At the time this set came out, Paul Goldschmidt was coming off a very good year and getting ready for a monster 2013 that saw him garner an All-Star appearance, Gold Glove and Silver Slugger awards, and finish 2nd to Andrew McCutchen in the MVP voting. He's been a monster in subsequent seasons as the Diamondbacks main star, and looks to be continuing his great play this year.
Aaron Hill seems to have a really good season every couple of years in between stretches of being replacement-level or slightly-better-than-replacement but injured for part of the season. He left Arizona for the 2016 season and is so far having an up year for the Brewers.
Eric Chavez played in 13 seasons for Oakland, and he was pretty good for about 9 of them. After that he couldn't stay on the field, then spent two years not being able to stay on the field for the Yankees, then moved to the Diamondbacks in 2013 for two seasons where he couldn't stay on the field. Then he retired at the end of July 2014.
Cliff Pennington joined the Diamondbacks by way of trade for 2013 after 5 years with the Athletics. He lasted a couple of years in Arizona before getting traded to the Blue Jays for a small part of the 2015 season. He then signed a 2-year contract with the Angels, where he has played in 27 games this year and is currently on the DL with hamstring issues.
Jason Kubel spent the first few years of his career in Minnesota, with 2009 really being his one standout year. Just going by the numbers, he was a pretty good offensive player during that time but his defense erased almost all of the good that came from his bat. He spent 2012 and 2013 in Arizona, then played 8 games for the Indians and closed out his career in 2014 with his original team, the Twins. They released him partway through that season.
Martin Prado was traded by the Braves to the Diamondbacks before the 2013 season as part of a package for Chris Johnson and Justin Upton. In 2014 he got traded to the Yankees for Peter O'Brien (who?), and in later 2014 he got traded to the Marlins in a deal that included David Phelps, Nathan Eovaldi, Garrett Jones, and Domingo German. He has been pretty solid basically ever since 2008, and is putting together a decent year for a surprising (to me) Marlins team that is currently tied with the Cardinals and Mets for a Wild Card spot.
In 2013 Parra was coming off of a couple pretty good years for Arizona. Partway through 2014 he was traded to the Brewers. Partway through 2015 he was traded to Baltimore, and he signed on with Colorado for 2016, where he is currently on the DL with an ankle inury.
Cody Ross played for a million (actually 8) teams during his 12 years in MLB, hitting paydirt with an NLCS MVP award and a Championship ring in 2010 with the Giants. He was a streaky player, dealt with quite a few injuries, and was apparently a good chemistry/fan favorite kind of player. He signed as a free agent with the Diamondbacks for 2013 and spent a good portion of 2013 and 2014 injured. In 2015 he signed with the Athletics and played in 9 games before being released.
2011 was Ian Kennedy's big year, although his 2012 for the Diamondbacks wasn't awful. In 2013 things started going downhill, and he was traded to the Padres. He had a pretty good 2014 for them, but that's about it. After 2015 he was granted free agency and signed with the Royals for this season, where he has not been great through 14 starts.
Trevor Cahill started out pretty strong in Oakland with some pretty good seasons in 2009-2011. He got traded to Arizona and had a decent 2012, but in 2013 the wheels started to come off. He got moved to the bullpen and then was traded to Atlanta to start the 2015 season. That stint wasn't very successful, and he was released and signed by the Cubs for the remainder of the 2015 season. He's been pretty decent for them in a relief role, and got signed by them again for 2016.
2012 was pretty good to Wade Miley. He finished 2nd to Bryce Harper in the Rookie of the Year voting and earned an All-Star berth. He's been average or worse since then, moving to Boston for 2015 and Seattle for 2016.
David Hernandez was coming off arguably his best career year when this card was released. Things have been down for him since then. He signed with the Phillies for 2016 and had a chance to compete for the closer role, but hasn't been effective enough for that.
Oakland and Arizona seem to exchange a lot of players, and Ziegler is one of those guys. He played a couple of years for Oakland, putting up pretty good numbers in relief. He was traded to Arizona in 2011 for a couple of guys I've never heard of. He has continued to play well for the Diamondbacks and has taken the closer role and run with it after J.J. Putz and Heath Bell lost the job in 2013.
Josh Collmenter has been bounced around a bit, logging quite a bit of time as a starter and a reliever. His numbers have been pretty good throughout his six seasons with Arizona, although it looks like he's benefited from defense and luck.
J.J. Putz was a relief pitcher for all of the 12 years he played. He spent some time as Seattle's closer, had a bad year with the Mets, an okay year for the White Sox, and then signed up with the Diamondbacks. He held down the closer role for them in 2011 and 2012, but lost the job in 2013 to Heath Bell, who subsequently lost the job to Brad Ziegler.
That's about it for the Diamondbacks. Not really a lot of highlights here for the number of cards they were allocated. Sorry if the player descriptions were a bit boring. I usually try to find more anecdotes and whatnot, but I was really just trying to get through this one.
That's about it for the Diamondbacks. Not really a lot of highlights here for the number of cards they were allocated. Sorry if the player descriptions were a bit boring. I usually try to find more anecdotes and whatnot, but I was really just trying to get through this one.
2013 SEGA Card-Gen Directory
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