The Colorado Rockies have beaten the Los Angeles Dodgers for the third straight game, handing an LA starter only his third loss of the season for the second time in this series. The Rockies offense got to lefty Alex Wood for five runs and got a good enough start from Chad Bettis and another shut down performance from the bullpen to secure the 6-5 win.
Gerardo Parra led off the second with a double off the wall in right and Trevor Story obliterated a first-pitch fastball, scorching his 20th home run of the season to put the Rockies on top 2-0. After Wood recorded a couple of outs, Charlie Blackmon stayed back and lined a single up the middle to score Ian Desmond, who had been hit by a pitch, making him 2-for-2 and the time and 7-for-his-last-8. Desmond scored, giving Blackmon 88 RBI out of the leadoff spot which ties the National League record.
DJ LeMahieu followed with a walk and Nolan Arenado singled to left to score Blackmon and give the Rockies a 4-0 lead. It was Arenado’s NL-leading 117th RBI of the season.
The Dodgers rallied in the fourth thanks to a nightmarish sequence of events for Colorado. First, it seemed Bettis had gotten Christ Taylor out a couple of times, getting what looked to be a strike three that was ruled a ball and then getting a fly to foul territory in right but Parra was unable to make the catch because he would have collided with a security guard. Still, Bettis got a routine grounder to third from Taylor but Arenado made one of his worst throws of the season, missing Mark Reynolds at first by a lot, and allowing Taylor to reach second.
After getting Corey Seager to ground out, Justin Turner fought off a tough inside fastball to single up the middle and get LA on the board. Cody Bellinger follow with an odd chopper double off Reynolds glove and Yasiel Puig got an even stranger double on a sinking line drive off the glove of Arenado at third. While it wasn’t an error, it was a play he usually makes but his second defensive mistake (by his standards) had the Dodgers to within one run. Bettis struck out Yasmani Grandal and got a groundball to short from Logan Forsythe but it was booted by Story. When Joc Pederson got out on a fastball and hit a liner to right, it just had the feel of the completion of making far too many mistakes but somehow it landed harmlessly in Parra’s glove and Colorado escaped with a 4-3 lead.
The Rockies got a run back taking advantage of a miscue of LA’s own in the top of the fifth. Reynolds led off with a single and Parra hit into what looked like a tailor-made double play, but Seager couldn’t get the ball out of his glove on the transfer and Parra was safe at first. That cost the Dodgers when Story rocketed a double into the left-center field gap, scoring Parra all the way from first. Story has destroyed left-handed pitching this season and the trend continued against Wood in this one. LA intentionally passed on Jonathan Lucroy, putting two runners on with two outs and Rockies manager Bud Black decided not to go to his bench, sending up Bettis who bounced weakly out.
The Dodgers answered back with a pinch-hit solo home run from Andre Ethier to lead off the bottom of the fifth. Bettis finished off the inning without further incident and that would complete his night.
His final line: 5 IP, 6 H, 3 ER, 0 BB, 5 K.
Scott Oberg came on for Bettis in the sixth and gave up a tough-luck, two-out bloop double to Forsythe but struck out the side on either side of that with some dominant fastball/slider combinations.
LA got a one-out base runner against Jake McGee in the eighth on a Cody Bellinger walk and Austin Barnes put a scare into McGee and the Rockies with a two-out line drive to deep center but Blackmon made a nice running catch to end the inning.
Arenado led off the top of the ninth by pulling a double just past Justin Turner at third and scored when Taylor couldn’t come up with a Parra sinking liner in center. It was ruled an RBI double for Parra.
Greg Holland came on for the close attempt and gave up a 3-2 solo home run to Forsythe, only his fifth homer of the year. But he bounced back to strike out Pederson and Curtis Granderson, getting Taylor on a close play finished off by none other than Nolan Arenado. Holland earned his NL-leading 38th save of the season.
With a two-hit ballgame, Blackmon now has an MLB-leading 195 hits. Going 0-for-4, DJ LeMahieu ended his hitting streak at 16 games. With three hits in the game, Arenado tied LeMahieu for fourth most in the NL at 167.
This is the first time the Rockies have beaten the Dodgers in LA three straight games since 2008.
Colorado improved to 77-65 but with both St. Louis and Milwaukee picking up wins, only managed to maintain their three-game lead for the second spot in the NL Wild Card. The Arizona Diamondbacks blew a big ninth-inning lead and have lost two in a row, putting Colorado five games back of the top NL Wild Card spot.
