Rockies Cerberus slays Nationals pitching to secure the series

The Colorado Rockies have a monster at the top of their lineup. Well, three of them actually. But when they hit like they did in Sunday’s 10-6 win over the Washington Nationals in the first game of a double header, they look like one giant, scary beast.

Nationals starter Erick Fedde, who made his debut in this game, will likely be seeing Charlie Blackmon, DJ LeMahieu, and Nolan Arenado in the form of one horrifying Cerberus in his nightmares. The trio went a combined 10-for-13 with two walks, five RBI, and six runs scored. Arenado drove in a pair, giving him 91 RBI on the season, 10 more than any other player in MLB.

With his four-hit day, Blackmon extended his own National League lead in the hit category, now with 140.

All told, the Rockies scored their 10 runs on 15 hits to power past the Nationals and secure the series win.

Kyle Freeland wasn’t as good as German Marquez was in the first game of the set but still battled through some command issues and some tough luck against a great lineup, showing the heart and the mental toughness he has become known for.

Freeland endured a rough third inning, giving up a line drive double to Brian Goodwin before Difo reached on Arenado’s fourth error of the season, a high throw that pulled the short Parra off the bag, missing a swipe tag attempt. The Rockies rookie lefty came through with a huge strikeout of Bryce Harper but Ryan Zimmerman took a pitch in the other batter’s box and hit a screaming line drive to right that just stayed fair and just cleared the short porch about 345 feet away. It was a cheap home run to tie the game but to be fair to Zimmerman, it’s probably still a double in most parks and it was a remarkable piece of hitting on a well-located pitch.

Story committed another error in the inning, but Freeland was able to escape with, ironically, some great defensive help in an inning with two errors, but a diving stop from Parra at first put an end to it and preserved the tie.

The rookie starter was helped again by two defensive gems in the fifth, a diving catch from Trevor Story to end the frame and this ridiculous play from Nolan Arenado who apparently can channel the spirit of Willie Mays:

RT SInow “Nolan Arenado makes it look routine. pic.twitter.com/GFBvHVaiuQ“

— Dak (@dak2zeke) July 30, 2017

Freeland’s day was done after that. His final line: 5 IP, 9 H, 3 ER, 0 BB, 4 K. He threw 55 of his 89 pitches for strikes.

It wasn’t dominant by any means, but for those who care about such things, he battled enough to get both the win and the quality start, outdueling his counterpart and putting his club in a chance to take their second in a row on the road against a very talented ballclub. It was the 35th win for a Rockies rookie pitcher this season, they need one more to tie the 1993 team for most in franchise history.

Greg Holland inherited a bases-loaded, one out situation in the bottom of the ninth and gave up a base hit to Anthony Rendon to make it 10-6 but then induced a game-ending double play from Howie Kendrick completed by a brilliant throw from Trevor Story. Holland recorded his MLB-leading 33rd save of the season.

Raimel Tapia led off the Rockies half of the ninth with a double on a ground ball that just got past the reach of Daniel Murphy but the Colorado outfielder turned on the jets and cruised into second with relative ease. He moved up on a Carlos Gonzalez ground out to second. He came in to score on a double off the bat of Ryan Hanigan.

Mike Dunn worked a 1-2-3 inning in the eighth with a pair of strikeouts. After getting the Tapia-fueled insurance run, Dunn stayed on in the ninth and allowed back-to-back singles to Goodwin and Difo but got Harper to pop out on the infield. It appeared as though he had Zimerman with a few low pitches but both were called balls as the Nationals slugger drew the walk to load the bases.

He appears to be fully recovered from his midseason injury that sapped much of his production for a while. Over his last 15 appearances (12 innings pitched) Dunn has allowed just two runs on seven hits with 13 strikeouts and four walks.

The Nationals made it 8-5 on a solo home run from Zimmerman, his second homer of the contest, against Pat Neshek. The newest Rockie finished off the rest of the seventh without any further base runners.

Chris Rusin pitched a clean sixth for Colorado and picked up the first out in the seventh, lowering his ERA to 2.80 over 54.2 innings pitched this season.

In the top of the sixth, the Rockies scored their eighth run on a pinch-hit double from Pat Valaika, who continues to be one of the best batters of the bench in baseball and a two-out double from LeMahieu who turned on an offspeed and actually pulled the ball over the left fielder’s head to make it 8-4.

Blackmon led off the third with another single and LeMahieu put together a vintage smart DJ at-bat, staying off a wicked 1-2 change up from Fedde and then staying back on the next one, driving it into the opposite field gap for an RBI double. Arenado singled and LeMahieu moved to third before Parra’s second run-scoring double play of the game made it 4-1, Rockies.

Freeland gave up a solo home run to Wilmer Difo in the bottom of the first, an early sign that Freeland would not dominate the day the way Marquez did.

Colorado jumped on top 2-0 in the first frame. The top three hitters started their incredible day, Blackmon and LeMahieu with singles and Arenado with a walk before Parra hit into his first of two run-scoring double plays to at least get the Rockies on the board. Tapia came through with a two-out single to score the second run of the game.

Colorado moved to 60-45 on the season and will aim to sweep the Nationals with the second game in this double header tonight at 5:00.