Is Minute Maid Park a baseball stadium, or a rocket launching pad?

At the end of the day, it’s just another “one” in the loss column, no matter how ugly it got. The Colorado Rockies, while not getting the sweep against the defending World Series champion Houston Astros on their own turf that they were hoping for, left H-Town with a split.

Tyler Anderson experienced struggles early and often for his second consecutive start, missing the strike zone entirely or catching too much of it, with scarce in between.

Even a strong production from the lineup would be hard pressed to recover from the position he put them right from the get-go, but the historically talented Astros rotation living up to the reputation didn’t help the Rockies feel any better about themselves. The tone of the game was set immediately and was consistent throughout the entirety of the game: Houston’s pitching was on, Colorado’s was not.

Gerrit Cole carved up the Rockies in the top of the first, striking out the side in order. In the bottom half, however, Anderson had polar results. He went double-walk-walk-double to put the Astros up by three before recording an out, struggling with his command mightily as the team’s first-inning woes continued.

The second inning wouldn’t be any kinder to Anderson, with an additional three runs crossing the plate thanks to his third walk of the game, a Tony Kemp double and a Yuli Gurriel two-run homer. The Astros continued to pile on in the third, as well, tallying another run on an Evan Gattis blast over the Crawford Boxes in left field.

Meanwhile, the Rockies offense sputtered, striking out nine times in the first five frames. They did record four hits in the span, with a trio of consecutive singles by Carlos Gonzalez, Nolan Arenado and Trevor Story, momentarily increasing the Rockies’ batting average with runners in scoring position to a whopping .166 in the month of August. It made the score 7-1 in favor of the defending world champions.

It increased Story’s hit streak to 12 games and gives him an RBI in three straight.

Whatever momentum gained from that string of hits was quickly shattered by a one-two-three inning in the fifth, followed by three more Houston runs in the bottom of the frame, including another home run surrendered by Anderson, this time a two-run shot off the bat of Tyler White that chased the Rockies’ starter from the game. Anderson left after 83 pitches in just 4.1 innings, allowing seven hits, all of which were doubles or home runs. The score stood at 9-1 as he exited.

Harrison Musgrave might have been choosing the wrong game to take notes on. Coming in for relief of Anderson, he immediately gave up a home run of his own to the second batter he faced in Gattis, who pushed his second shot of the game just over the close right field wall.

In the sixth, manager Bud Black called mercy, subbing Charlie Blackmon for recently-recalled Garrett Hampson, who made his first MLB appearance in center field. The changes got stranger in the seventh, with Tony Wolters making his debut in left field. Pat Valaika also spelled Story at shortstop.

White wasn’t ready to let the game end quickly, though. In the seventh, he too launched his second homer of the game, putting Houston up 12-1. Following the blast, the Astros had nine hits, none of them singles.

That changed, too, as back-to-back singles from Kyle Tucker and Gattis chased Musgrave. Chris Rusin filled his absence, making his first appearance since July 22. If there is one silver lining in this game for Colorado, it is Rusin, who looked very sharp in the admittedly low leverage situation. He recorded five outs on 13 pitches with a pair of strikeouts.

Cole exited after six innings, striking out a dozen and allowing only five hits—all of them singles. Alex Pressly struck out the side in the seventh and Will Harris got Ryan McMahon swinging in the eighth to run the Rockies’ K total to 16, a season high and the most since April 30, 2017 against the Arizona Diamondbacks.

The Rockies, after they dragged themselves across the finish line, dropped to 64-56 and 1.5 games back of the first-place Diamondbacks in the National League West.

Final Stats:

Tyler Anderson: 4.1 IP, 7 H, 9 ER, 3 BB, 4 K

Harrison Musgrave: 2 IP, 4 H, 9 ER, 1 BB, 1 K

Chris Rusin: 1.2 IP, 0 H, 0 ER, 0 BB, 2 K

Nolan Arenado: 2-for-3, 1 BB

Trevor Story: 1-for-3, 1 R, 1 RBI 

Charlie Blackmon: 0-for-3, 3 K

What’s Next:

The Rockies’ road trip continues to Suntrust Park, where they’ll take on the red-hot Atlanta Braves for two. The Braves, at the time of posting, are on their way to their fifth consecutive win as they stand atop the National League East standings with a 68-51 record.

Jon Gray will square off with Julio Teheran, owner of a 4.33 ERA, 1.25 WHIP and 117 strikeouts in 126 innings.

First pitch is 5:35 p.m. Mountain Time.