The Colorado Rockies lost their road mojo and had their six-game winning streak snapped on Wednesday night in an 8-2 loss to the Arizona Diamondbacks. Rockies’ starter Germán Márquez was hit hard and unable to make it out of the fourth inning while the offense struggled to get anything going against Diamondbacks’ starter Patrick Corbin.
Hits came early and often for Arizona, who now leads the Rockies by four games for the top Wild Card spot with just sixteen to play. They battered Márquez for four runs on 11 hits—five of them doubles—prior to his being pulled with two outs in the fourth inning. For Rockies fans, the most frustrating of the four runs allowed by Márquez came when Corbin reached on a line drive single with two outs and nobody on in the second inning before immediately being driven in by David Peralta’s RBI double. Entering tonight, Corbin was hitting just .080/.179/.080 on the season, so allowing him to reach and extend the inning in that situation simply can’t happen.
On the other side of the ball, Corbin was also extremely effective at keeping Rockies’ hitters off balance. The 28-year-old was dominant through 6 2⁄3 innings of work, with his only blemish coming on DJ LeMahieu’s solo home run in the sixth inning. He allowed just four hits in total, walked a pair, and struck out seven as he lowered his ERA to 4.06 on the season.
In spite of that, the Rockies were able to maintain contact as they trailed just 5-1 into the seventh inning. That changed when A.J. Pollock hit a three-run homer—the biggest blow during his three hit night that saw him drive in four—off Carlos Estevez to put it entirely out of reach. Estevez was able to get only one out before allowing five straight hitters to reach. He ultimately allowed three runs and saw his ERA balloon to 6.84 on the season.
In the ninth, the Rockies scored a largely meaningless run on Jonathan Lucroy’s RBI ground out following Ryan Hanigan’s pinch-hit single and a double by Ian Desmond off Diamondbacks’ reliever T.J. McFarland to make it 8-2.
With the loss, the Rockies fall to 80-66 on the season. They’ll have to wait at least one more day to clinch their first .500 or better season since 2010. Arizona, on the other hand, improves to 84-62 and improve their commanding lead on the top Wild Card spot—and home game that comes with it—to four games. The finale of this four-game set is tomorrow afternoon as Chad Bettis takes the ball for the Rockies against Zack Godley. First pitch is scheduled for 1:40 pm mountain time.