Luis Gonzalez was a good baseball player before he was traded to the Arizona Diamondbacks, but it was in the desert where he became an All-Star and the team’s premier offensive threat.

Gonzalez’s 1999 debut season with the D-Backs saw him post career highs in Hits (206), and Batting Average (.336), and it would be his first of three .300/.400/.500 Slash Lines.  It also marked the first of five consecutive RBI seasons. 

2001 was, without a doubt, the best season of his career.  “Gonzo” would blast 57 Home Runs with a Slash Line of .325/.429/.688 and finished third in MVP voting.  More importantly, he would help the Diamondbacks win the World Series in 2001 and would have the Series-winning hit with the most famous bloop single of all time.  That secured Gonzalez as a forever legend in the state of Arizona.

Luis Gonzalez would represent Arizona five times in the All-Star Game and accrued 224 Home Runs over his career with the team.  Arizona would also make Gonzalez the first former Diamondback to have his number retired, which occurred when his number 20 was put out of circulation in 2010.

Gonzo may not be #1 on this list, but for many, he will always be the most beloved Diamondback that ever existed. 

Curt Schilling did not spend a long time in Arizona (three and a half years) but nobody can dispute the impact that he had as a Diamondback.

Playing his entire career with the Diamondbacks, sinkerball specialist Brandon Webb had a rough start.  In his second season in the Majors, Webb led the National League in Losses and Walks allowed.  That was 2004.  Two years later, Webb transformed himself into the best hurlerin the National League.

Webb would win the National League Cy Young Award while leading the NL in Wins, FIP, and bWAR for Pitchers.  This would be the first All-Star Game appearance but not the last.  Webb remained in All-Star form in 2007 and 2008, and in both years he was the Cy Young Award runner-up. 

Sadly, Webb’s shoulder gave out, and he went from an elite pitcher to out of baseball quickly.  Still, those three excellent seasons on a franchise this young earned Webb this high rank, and his sinker will love forever.

Webb left the game with a record of 87-62 and 1,065 Strikeouts in a career spent entirely in Arizona.

For nearly a decade, "Goldy" served as the quiet, relentless heartbeat of the Diamondbacks, transforming from an unheralded 8th-round draft pick into the greatest position player in franchise history.

Bursting onto the scene in late 2011, he famously announced his arrival with a massive postseason grand slam that ignited the desert. By 2013, he had evolved into a full-blown supernova. That season remains a masterclass in offensive and defensive dominance:  That season, he won the Hank Aaron Award, along with his first Gold Glove and Silver Slugger, while leading the NL in Home Runs (36), RBIs (125), and Slugging (.551), and was second in MVP voting.  Goldy had arrived, and he was ready to dominate the rest of the decade.

Over eight seasons in Arizona, he became a fixture at the All-Star game and a perennial MVP candidate, finishing in the top three of voting three different times.  In 2016, he led the NL in walks (110) while remarkably stealing 32 bases—an unheard-of feat for a powerhouse first baseman.  As the D-Back’s fortunes fell, Goldschmidt left Arizona with 209 home runs, over 1,100 hits, and a staggering career slash line of .297/.398/.532.

He later won the 2022 NL MVP as a St. Louis Cardinal, and Paul Goldschmidt remains the benchmark by which all future Diamondback position players are measured.