I had my game wrap all written up, "United States 7, Rockies 2" then the 9th inning happened (sorry baseball gods).
Down 7-2 in the 9th the Rockies stormed back with 7 straight two out singles to beat Team USA 8-7.
The good parts:
Obviously, scoring 6 runs in the 9th inning all with two outs is good.
Nolan Arenado went 2-5 with a double and 2 RBI's and one of his outs was a line shot to left off of Atlanta Braves closer Craig Kimbrel.
Getting 15 base hits, granted 13 of them were singles.
The other extra base hit was a double by Jordan Pacheco.
Drew Pomeranz pitched valiantly considering he had been sick the previous 4 days. He pitched 2 2/3 innings and according to John Heyman of CBS was hitting 92-96 on the radar gun. The only run he gave up scored when he was relieved by Edgmer Escalona who gave up a soft single to New York Mets 3B, David Wright.
Wilton Lopez and Adam Ottavino both pitched scoreless innings.
Team USA is essentially an all-star team. We beat an all-star team.
The bad parts:
The most glaring bad thing was that all 8 of the Rockies runs came off of their own pitchers who were pitching for Team USA. Ooops.
Chris Volstad was not sharp. Is there leniency because of the lineup he faced? Probably. Giving up 8 hits in 3 innings is never good though.
Josh Outman picked up the win, but he gave up 2 runs in his inning of work.
Brandon Phillips went 4-4. Good for Team USA, bad for Team Rockies.
Any way you spin it the Rockies still scored 6 runs in the 9th to win the game and that's something to get excited about. I'm not saying it's like the comeback against the Cardinals in which we were down 9-3 headed to the 9th only to win it 12-9 on a Seth Smith three run shot ( I just wanted to bring that game up) but it's still good to see. Hopefully, it's a sign of things to come for the Rockies under new manager Walt Weiss. Never quit kids.
Up Next:
The Rockies are off tomorrow. Time enough to celebrate the win and recharge the batteries. Next game is Friday against the Kansas City Royals at 7:10 MST.