SPORTS WALK GIVES ROCKIES THIRD STRAIGHT WIN
ROCKIES 4, DODGERS 3 Bases-loaded walk latest way Colorado rallies to beat rival Los Angeles
Of the main factors that will determine Colorado’s homestretch chances at a first divisional title, only continued stellar starting pitching and the stabilization of the bullpen might be more important than guts. The Rockies had to summon that last quality in large quantities to finish off a series victory Sunday at Coors Field over the Los Angeles Dodgers.
The club’s third win in four tries against the Dodgers was earned in dramatic fashion for the second consecutive game, with Chris Iannetta‘s walk-off, bases-loaded walk with two outs in the bottom of the ninth inning the difference as the Rockies beat Los Angeles 4-3.
“In order for us to make the playoffs, we need to have big innings and we need to come back from adversity,” said Rockies second baseman DJ LeMahieu, who walked home for the game-winning run. “We’re not going to play perfect every day, but we keep fighting, and the results in the last three games are some incredible wins.”
The Rockies remained 1½ games behind NL West-leading Arizona and pulled a half game behind the secondplace Dodgers.
The Rockies took the momentum right off the bat when shortstop Trevor Story put Colorado ahead with a first-inning sacrifice fly, and David Dahl‘s RBI single pushed Colorado’s
lead to 2-0 in the fourth. That was followed by Charlie Blackmon‘s 22nd home run of the season, this one 369 feet to the opposite field, to make it 3-0.
All the while, starting pitcher Chad Bettis rebounded from an ugly outing last week with six innings of shutout baseball.
“His fastball had pretty good command. His changeup was effective. He got inside to some lefties and painted some balls in to righties,” Rockies manager Bud Black said. “He had them off balance, which is what Chad does.”
But the Dodgers got going against Colorado in the seventh inning when Bettis was chased from the game after the righthander issued a one-out walk to Yasmani Grandal.
It was the first of a couple of moments that proved Sunday’s springboard victory, like the two like proceeded it, would not come easy against a Dodgers team laden with the superior offensive depth it demonstrated while blasting five home runs in Colorado’s blown series opener last Thursday.
“You need the good wins to balance out the tough losses,” Black said. “That sustains a level of where you are, and where you think you can go. If you don’t have emotional wins to counter the tough losses, it makes it tough to sustain momentum.”
Jake McGee came on in relief in the seventh inning and yielded a double to Justin Turner, which set up Brian Dozier’s two-RBI seeing-eye groundball single off Scott Oberg to cut the Rockies’ lead to 3-2. Then, the usually unshakable Adam Ottavino was dinged for the equalizing run in the ninth via Matt Kemp’s sacrifice fly that scored Yasiel Puig.
But Wade Davis dug deep to kept the game tied by getting out of a walk-caused jam in the ninth before a LeMahieu single and two intentional walks to Dahl and Ryan McMahon led to Iannetta’s game-deciding at-bat.
“Even though we were at 3-3 there in the ninth, I felt like something was going to happen in our favor,” Bettis said. “Whatever that late-inning magic is, we’ve got it going right now, and it was a gutsy team win.”