Snells Like Another Shutout: Rockies dominated in fourth straight loss

It was the great misfortune for the Colorado Rockies to be matched up against the reigning, defending, and undisputed AL Cy Young Award winner Blake Snell on Tuesday night in Tampa.

He was everything that title would suggest, producing a career-high 13 strikeouts against a Colorado Rockies offense that continues to search for answers in Florida.

The boys in purple pinstripes only manages two singles, both from Trevor Story, neither hit especially hard, against Snell who darted his deliveries across the strike zone like he was carving a cake.

The fortunes weren’t much better for starting pitcher Kyle Freeland who made a mess for himself that the baseball gods deemed unworthy to recover from unscathed.

He started wild, walking Yandy Diaz.

He bounced back to strike out Tommy Pham but surrendered a ground ball single to Daniel Robertson to put a pair aboard.

Then he lost control again, unleashing a wild pitch an walking Avisail Garcia to load the bases.

But Freeland kept his focus, as he so often does in these situations, and got the ground ball he needed from Mike Zunino. Or at least, it seemed like the ground ball he needed.

Nolan Arenado fielded the weak roller but decided quickly that he would not have time to reach third and fire across for the double play, electing instead to go home with the throw for the force out.

But in the action, catcher Chris Iannetta’s foot came off the plate and after a review, the out was taken off the board and a run was put there in its place.

That issue compounded when Guillermo Heredia looped a single into left field, scoring a pair.

Though, as it turned out, that first run on the overturned play was all the Rays really needed.

Freeland recovered nicely, if you’re wondering. He even ended up striking out the side in the first and 10 over just 4.2 innings, only the second time in his career he has reached double-digit Ks in a game.

But the damage was done to his pitch count and at 99 in under five innings of work, he had to be removed in favor of Carlos Estevez who was called up earlier in the day when Jake McGee went on the Injured List.

Other than the two hits for Story, walks for Chris Iannetta and Ian Desmond were the only other times the Rockies reached base. They never got to second base.

Final Stats

Kyle Freeland: 4.2 IP, 3 H, 3 R, 2 ER, 4 BB, 10 K

Carlos Estevez: 1.1 IP, 2 H, 1 R, 1 ER, 0 BB, 2 K

Seunghwan Oh: 1 IP, 2 H, 0 BB, 1 K

Bryan Shaw: 1 IP, 1 H, 0 ER, 1 BB, 1 K

Trevor Story: 2-for-3

What’s Next

The Rockies wrap up their series in Tampa looking to salvage a game tomorrow… morning. German Marquez gets the start for Colorado, Charlie Morton will go for Tampa. First pitch at 11:10 Mountain Time.