Rockies rally falls just short in loss to Cards

DENVER – The Colorado Rockies put themselves in position for another dramatic late comeback, this time in the opener against the St. Louis Cardinals, but they couldn’t get the big hit early or late, resulting in a 7-5 loss.

The Rockies rallied and had a shot at another dramatic late win, but it was not to be this time.

Everything that could go wrong did go wrong for the Rockies in the early innings.

Colorado managed to get a pair of baserunners in each of the first three innings for a total of six singles but could not plate any of them.

That was made all the more frustrating for the home fans in a second inning that saw St. Louis scored four runs to take a commanding lead. It began when Tyler O’Neil ran into a 1-2 pitch that hung up in the zone and belted it to left field for his fifth homer of the season.

After recording an out, Senzatela walked Jedd Gryorko and surrendered a single to Kolten Wong. He bounced back to strike out Harrison Bader, which was huge with the runner at third, but a miscue from Tony Wolters behind the plate on Wong’s stolen base allowed Gyorko to score. That seemed to impact Senzatela’s focus for a moment as he threw a high fastball that his counterpart Miles Mikolas launched over the wall in center, his second home run of the season.

The Cardinals jumped out even further with another outpouring in the top of the fifth. Yadier Molina and Jose Martinez opened with back-to-back singles. Molina scored on a double over Charlie Blackmon’s head in center off the bat of O’Neil and Martinez scored on a double from Gyorko before manager Bud Black went to Chris Rusin.

Wong was able to get a sac fly to left against Rusin before the inning was finally put away with the Rockies down a staggering 7-0.

But they stormed back with a huge bottom of the fifth.

Gerardo Parra started it innocuously with a single back up the middle and Blackmon got his club on the board by blasting a hanging breaking ball over the wall in right-center field. After a sharp groundout from David Dahl, Nolan Arenado matched Blackmon with a homer of his own, his 31st of the year.

Carlos Gonzalez and Trevor Story kept the pressure on with consecutive singles to put runners at first and third with one out. Ian Desmond followed with a with a groundball that the Cardinals tried to turn into a double play. Desmond was going to beat the throw, and CarGo was going to score anyway, but a wild one allowed Desi to get all the way to third which paid off when Ryan McMahon delivered a two-out bloop single to left to pull the Rockies to within two.

Chad Bettis made his first appearance out of the bullpen this season in the sixth and worked a clean frame.

But the bottom of the sixth went just about the same as the first three innings. Matt Holliday, pinch-hitting for Bettis, recorded his first hit since rejoining his old team, a single to center. Blackmon followed by drawing a five-pitch walk that easily could have been a four-pitch walk. Then Bader stole a bloop single from Dahl with a diving catch, Arenado struck out, and Gonzalez flew out to end the threat without a score.

Scott Oberg pitched a 1-2-3 seventh with a pair of strikeouts. He stayed on for the eighth and gave up a leadoff single to Wong who was thrown out trying to steal second and worked around a Desmond error on a funky hop to keep the game close.

The Rockies managed to make some headway against reliever Jordan Hicks who sits on 100 mph with his sinker. After Wolters hit it well but ended up with an out, DJ LeMahieu walked in a pinch-hit appearance, Blackmon singled, and Arenado drew a walk in a sequence that revealed little interest in challenging him.

Gonzalez got one down the middle on an 0-1 count in the next at-bat but got on top of it hit, grounding out to second to leave ’em loaded.

Wade Davis worked a clean ninth to give the Rockies one more chance to rally.

Colorado once again got two baserunners this time after making two outs. Ryan McMahon doubled over the head of O’Neil in left and Chris Iannetta drew a walk in the pinch to get LeMahieu to the plate at the potential winning run.

But he grounded out to third, ending the game and making the Rockie 1-for-11 in the contest with runners in scoring position.

What’s Next:

The Rockies try to pull even on Saturday behind German Marquez. The Cards send John Gant to the hill. First pitch at 6:10 Mountain Time.