Last year, many who pay attention to such things placed their bets on the Arizona Diamondbacks to lead a strong NL West.  Those souls were all wrong, both about the D’backs and about that strong NL West.  Since then we haven’t heard too much about the D’backs and their prospects for 2009, and thats probably because they aren’t very good.  The organization has just laid off 31 employees.  The tighter economy is partially at fault, as, most likely the expiration of many 10-year sponsorship agreements and suite sales.  When those all expire at the same time, as any would in a stadium that opened 10 years ago, and the economy is down well, the budget gets slashed.  Nick Piecoro’s article about the state of the D’backs is telling.  Yes, they could be better than they were in ‘08, but that depends on quite a few offensive players improving, ailing players getting healthy and staying healthy, and the pitching holding the line at least where it was last year.  Bob Melvin, the team’s manager, will be the first manager to go next season if Arizona doesn’t do all of those things.  San Diego and Colorado in theory won’t be as good as they were last year– though I would argue Colorado’s pitching will be better, just their offense will be worse– but the Dodgers are poised to spend some money to ensure that they don’t slide backward in their division. Even if the D’backs could resign their free agents, the number of draft picks they will gain this off-season for not signing them will keep them in business for a long time.  This is a team to watch, because it seems also to be the first team affected by the economy downturn and how it maneuvers will affect it for years to come.