Anderson's gem delivers sweep of Giants

DENVER – Colorado Rockies pitching is on a roll.

Tyler Anderson, after putting together his second consecutive brilliant outing, has not allowed a run, and has given up just six singles over his last 16 innings. Yes, he has also pitched through eight for a second straight time after becoming the first member of the club to accomplish that feat this season just five days ago.

HIs counterpart was nearly as dominant but the Rockies got a well-timed solo home run from their catcher, making the battery the unquestioned heroes of the first 1-0 win on a solo HR at Coors Field in over eight years, finishing off a sweep of the San Francisco Giants.

The last person to do it? Also Chris Iannetta in 2010

The Rockies missed some early opportunities to put some runs on the board against Andrew Suarez.

DJ LeMahieu singled to lead off the first and moved up on a Charlie Blackmon groundout. After a review revealed that Trevor Story clearly beat out a grounder to short, the Rockies had runners at first and third with two outs but Ian Desmond hit a weak grounder back to the pitcher and the Giants were able to escape.

Again in the third, Colorado earned a couple of baserunners but was unable to score. LeMahieu once again was at the forefront, hitting a hard line drive off the wall in right-center field for a one-out double. Blackmon that hit a hard grounder that Joe Panik misplayed at second, though it went down as a single.

With the ball skipping a few feet away, third-base coach Stu Cole initially signaled for LeMahieu to try to score but changed to hold him up at the last minute with Panik collecting himself and the baseball perhaps a bit quicker than anticipated.

It’s hard to say that the runner would have been safe but the decision definitely came back to haunt the Rockies when Nolan Arenado popped up to the third baseman and Story flew out to left.

The game was flying by as both starters carved up the offenses with expertise.

But Colorado finally got to Suarez in the bottom of the seventh. After Desmond narrowly missed driving one out of the park, Chris Iannetta did not. Going down to get a breaking pitch, he launched one high and deep to left, the only question was whether or not the ball stayed fair as it sailed over the foul pole.

With Anderson at just 93 pitches, manager Bud Black elected to pinch-hit Tom Murphy for him in the bottom of the eighth and hand the ball to closer Wade Davis for the ninth.

Davis struck out Gorkys Hernandez and Brandon Belt to ground out to second but surrendered a two-out single to Andrew McCutchen to bring Buster Posey to the plate with the tying run aboard. The Rockies closer couldn’t find the zone against Posey and issued the walk to put the tying run in scoring position.

The Giants went to pinch-hitter Brandon Crawford when he launched one into the third deck, but it went well foul. He still ended up striking the ball well but Noel Cuevas caught it just in front of the warning track in right to the eruption of the sellout crowd, putting away the unlikely win.

Colorado moved back over .500 at 44-43 and are now just 4.5 games out of first place in the NL West.

Final Stats:

Tyler Anderson: 8 IP, 2 H, 0 ER, 2 BB, 9 K

Chris Iannetta: 1-for-3, 1 R, 1 RBI, HR (7)

Wade Davis: 1 IP, 1 H, 0 ER, 1 BB, 1 K (S: 25)

What’s Next:

After a day off on Thursday, the Rockies are off for a rare interleague series in Seattle against the Mariners. German Marquez will attempt to match Tyler Anderson by repeating his own most recent eight-inning performance. He faces off against personal hero Felix Hernandez. First Pitch on Friday is at 8:10 Mountain Time.