#13
Thursday 15th April — Colorado Rockies vs LA Dodgers @ Dodgers Stadium
Thursday evening was an all-around different game to the Rockies-Dodgers Wednesday night affair. A stingy, defensive performance on Wednesday gave way to a high-octane, run-scoring game Thursday evening. Most amazingly, the Rockies were actually in a position to win on the night, hoping to take one game back from the Dodgers and prevent the 3–0 series sweep.
The Rockies started quickly, with Ryan McMahon hitting his 6th HR of the year in the top of the 1st to give the Rockies a quick 1–0 lead. This was the first time that the Rockies had led at at point during the current 3-game series against the Dodgers. The lead was doubled in the top of the 3rd inning with Garrett Hampson hitting his own leadoff HR to give the Rockies a 2–0 lead.
Austin Gomber got the start for the Rockies and continued to rebound strongly from his poor first start of the season. Gomber pitched 6 inning, allowing three earned runs, two walks and 7 strikeouts. Gomber’s curveball is quite a sight to behold, dropping from north to south with gusto in the batters box and leaving Dodgers batters swinging and missing all night. After a strong 1st and 2nd inning, Gomber allowed a 1-out blooper single in the bottom of the 3rd, followed by a walk of Taylor. This brought Justin Turner to the plate, who hit one of the Dodgers 2x 3-run HRs on the day and allowed the Dodgers to reclaim the lead by the time the bottom of the 3rd inning had finished.
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Unusually, the Rockies struck back. In the top of the 6th, Ryan McMahon hit a 1-out double, quickly followed by an RBI single from CJ Cron and a subsequent Josh Fuentes hit. 3 hits in a row for the Rockies. From there, some unusually sloppy defence from the Dodgers saw 2 further runs score, giving the Rockies a 5–3 lead heading into the final third of the game. With Gomber now out of the game, the Rockies turned to the bullpen to try and hold on to the lead and salvage something from this away series.
What followed was typical of the Rockies season to date — Yancy Almonte came in to pitch for Colorado in the bottom of the 7th inning. He quickly allowed 2x LA baserunner and was further punished by the 2nd 3-run HR of the evening by the Dodgers, this time from Max Muncy. With that, the Dodgers reclaimed the lead. The night went from bad to worse for the Rockies bullpen: Tyler Kinley came in to pitch and was pulled after facing three batters and loading the bases. Estevez came in to finish the inning, but not before a wild pitch allowed the Dodgers to score another run. And just like that, the Rockies bullpen had turned a lead into a deficit within three outs. All the positive momentum from Gomber’s pitching and the Rockies early runs came to nought.
The Rockies have now lost 6 consecutive games — all on the road. For large swathes of this away series, the Rockies have been terrible. Even when the Rockies showed some credible offence as they did on Thursday night, the bullpen squandered it and left the team high and dry . Teams will be comfortable keeping games close when the Rockies starting pitchers are on the mount knowing that they’ll be able to capitalise on Colorado’s terrible bullpen to pull back the runs they need later in the game. This puts the entire team in a bind — and also makes it feel worse when the Rockies inevitably concede late in games.
With the Dodgers, and this wider away series, in the rear-view mirror, the Rockies head back to Colorado with a lot of soul searching to do. It isn’t immediately apparent where relief of any kind will come to make this season even salvageable. The Rockies have a pretty poor farm system at the moment, and with one of the worst records in baseball, it’s unlikely that they are going to suppliment this team with any exciting players in the coming weeks and months. During the offseason, Dick Monfort (Rockies owner) said that he believes this team has a roster which allowed it to be competitive, even without Nolan Arenado. I’d advise Rockies fan to stock up on whatever Monfort was smoking, because this team is a million miles away from being competitive.
Final Score — Colorado Rockies 5 — LA Dodgers 7
Rockies MVP — Alan Trejo got his 1st Major League hit in the bottom of the 9th (that’s always a nice story).
Rockies Record — 3–10
