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The Rockies fell to 1-6 on their 10 game road trip with a 5-1 loss in front of a sold-out PNC crowd on Sunday. A.J. Burnett tossed a complete game allowing eight hits (all singles), one walk and one run while striking out nine. With Burnett relying heavily on his fastball and curve ball, there appeared to be little Rockies hitters could do as they consistently made weak contact on the afternoon.
The Pirates picked up a quick first inning run and never looked back as they tacked on with another run in the third and then a fifth inning three-run blast off the bat of Russell Martin. Pittsburgh was able to make Rockies starter Juan Nicasio throw a lot of pitches and while they didn't hit him very hard, he had to exit the game after 4.1 innings with runners on first second because he had reached 103 pitches.
Manny Corpas came in and promptly gave up the afore mentioned three-run home run to Martin on the first pitch he threw. Nicasio's final line: 4.1 innings, six hits, four runs, three walks, and four strike outs. Corpas ended up going 1.2 innings before giving way to Josh Outman and Matt Belisle, both of whom worked scoreless innings.
A bright spot offensively for Colorado was Johnathan Herrera, who went 3-for-3 with an RBI and a wacky base hit in the fifth. Herrera grounded a ball to second that looked like an easy double play, but the ball took a very strange hop up over the head of second baseman Neil Walker for a base hit. It gave the Rockies runners at first and third with one out, but Nicasio bunted into a fielder's choice and Corey Dickerson grounded out to end the threat.
With the loss Nicasio dropped to 6-6 and saw his ERA rise to 5.05 on the season. The Rockies are off tomorrow as they travel to New York to start the last leg of the road trip with a three game set in Queens against the New York Metropolitans.
Source: FanGraphs
