Rally wasted, K.C. scores twice in 9th inning
When Lodo Magic disappears you know the Rockies are in a rut.
The Royals’ wild victory Sunday afternoon at Coors Field was proof of that. The Royals scored two runs off Rockies closer Daniel Bard to pull out an 8-7 victory.
Salvador Perez delivered a bases-loaded, two-run single to provide the victory.
The rally began with pinch hitter Andrew Benintendi drawing a five-pitch walk off of Bard, followed by a single by pinch-hitter Ryan O’hearn, and a one-out walk by Michael Taylor, setting up Perez’s game-winner.
“The at-bat to Benintendi is the one that I would want back,” said Bard, who had converted eightstraight save opportunities prior to Sunday’s failure in the ninth. “There is a fine line between pitching carefully and pitching not aggressively. I was kind of toeing that line and I fell behind to him and didn’t make a pitch to get back in the count.”
Coming off a tough 1-5 road trip, Colorado figured it would heal up at home. After all, the club was 12-6 at Coors entering Sunday. But the Royals — eight games under .500 with a 12-20 record — took two of three games over the weekend to win the series.
The reeling Rockies have lost seven of their last nine games.
But miracles often happen in Lodo for the Rockies, and Sunday, their seventh-inning rally looked like manna from heaven. That’s what made the loss so tough to stomach.
“I hated it,” Bard said. “I feel so bad. These guys worked their butts off to get us back in that game and give us a lead. These are the ones you want to nail down.”
Manager Bud Black brushed off the idea that the tough loss would have a hangover effect as the playoff-contending Giants come to town for a three-game series beginning Monday.
“We’ll be fine,” Black said. “Baseball players, because of the amounts of games that they’ve played over the course of their careers, (know) there are tough losses. You learn to turn the page and bounce back.
“I think guys will realize that this was a great comeback in the seventh inning, down six runs …
the at-bats we put together. There are no ill effects to this, for me.”
Colorado had only three hits and trailed 6-0 through its first six at-bats. Facing Kansas City lefty Daniel Lynch, Rockies hitters appeared to have settled in for a Sunday afternoon siesta. But the bats woke up and they sent 11 men to the plate in the seventh.
Colorado’s go-ahead, but ultimately wasted rally, began innocently enough with a leadoff single by Elias Diaz off reliever Collin Snider. Back-to-back, one-out walks by Garrett Hampson and Connor Joe off of Amri Garrett loaded the bases for Yonathan Daza, the Rockies’ hottest hitter.
Daza delivered a two-run single to right and the Rockies were off to the races.
“It was nice to see everybody put good (at-bats) together,” said Daza, who extended his careerbest on-base streak to 13 games,
going 2-for-5 with a double. “We were close man, we were close.”
An RBI single by C.J. Cron, an error by second baseman Nicky Lopez, a two-run single by Randal Grichuk and a sacrifice fly by Diaz completed Colorado’s rally.
Rockies left-hander Austin
Gomber, who’s been so successful at Coors, gave up just four hits in his six innings, but two of those hits were homers. Emmanuel Harris tattooed a hanging curveball in the fifth for a two-run homer to left, and Whit Merrifield led off with a sixth with a blast to left.
Black liked Gomber’s overall performance, especially his fastball command. Gober agreed.
“I definitely thought I commanded my fastball well and moved it around to both sides,” he said. “I used the changeup early but my breaking balls weren’t as good as they have been.”
Kansas City extended its lead to 6-0 with a three-run seventh off Jhoulys Chacin, whose ERA has soared to 8.22. The right-hander was tagged by a leadoff homer by Bobby Witt Jr. and gave up two walks and a double in two-thirds of an inning.
Colorado was unable to solve Lynch, who pitched 5 L scoreless frames. It was his third scoreless outing of the season. While Lynch struck out four, he also walked four, but the Rockies couldn’t take advantage.
“He’s got good stuff, he’s got a good arm,” Black said. “We laid off some sliders and we laid off some borderline pitches.”