Rockies road trip of cash ends in a clunker

The Colorado Rockies concluded a successful road trip with a couple of clunkers in Arizona, losing the last two games of the trip, including Thursday afternoon’s contest by a score of 6-0, to end the stretch at 6-2. The Rockies were cash on this trip, but it ended in a clunker.

Still an overwhelmingly positive journey, these last two games have been remarkably ugly and never particularly close. Rockies starter Chad Bettis was only able to record one out, getting pummeled in the first by the usual suspects in the Arizona lineup. Gregor Blanco led off with a walk and moved to third on a double from Chris Iannetta, then Jake Lamb walked to load the bases. Paul Goldschmidt followed that up with a hard single to left, plating a run before Bettis had recorded an out. He got a force out from the Diamondback’s hottest hitter, J.D. Martinez, but then issued a bases-loaded walk to Brandon Drury, bringing in the second run.

A.J. Pollock then broke the game wide open for the second straight day, smashing a bases-clearing double over the head of Charlie Blackmon in center field, putting the Diamondbacks up 5-0 in the first, and sending Bettis to the showers early.

Chris Rusin replaced Bettis to record the final two outs on a quick pair of groundballs.

The Rockies had a chance to get back into the game in the second after a pair of one-out singles from Gerardo Parra and Trevor Story but Ian Desmond grounded into an inning-ending double play.

Martinez added on in the third with an opposite-field blast off of Rusin, his 39th home run of the season. It was one of only two hits and the only run Rusin gave up over 2.2 innings.

Antonio Senzatela walked a batter but did not allow a hit or a run in his inning of work. Adam Ottavino was tagged for a run on singles from Martinez and Pollock and that was the last of the scoring.

The Rockies recorded only five hits in the game, all from the bottom half of the lineup, and did not record an extra-base hit until an eighth-inning Desmond double. This was pretty much the epitome of a dud game.

Colorado fell to 80-67 and now has a 2.5 game lead over the Milwaukee Brewers in the NL Wild Card.