Baseball Isn’t Fair; Rockies Defeat Mets Anyway

This past weekend was a brutal reminder of the fickle nature of baseball for the Colorado Rockies. Josh Rutledge and Eric Young Jr., the two players at the heart of the team’s recent resurgence, were both injured in the same game, which also happened to be a match-up with Miami Marlins ace Josh Johnson. They won anyway. On that same day, one of the worst Rockies in franchise history, Jeremy Guthrie, took a no-hitter into the 8th inning, providing further evidence that this game simply is not fair.

Somehow the Rockies, who spent most of this season finding a way to lose, are now finding ways to win in situations where most people would cut them some slack for losing. Consider last night’s game. They were forced to face the New York Mets and Cy Young candidate RA Dickey with a lineup that consisted of Charlie Blackmon in the leadoff spot and Andrew Brown in the cleanup spot. No disrespect to either of those players, but that was not the plan this season. And yet, led by the solid pitching of Alex White and Guillermo Moscoso (seriously), the Rockies stayed in the game and found a way to win late by a final score of 3-1.

In a night where offense was hard to come by, it was the grit of Jonathan Herrera that led to the go-ahead run for the Rockies. He dropped down a beautiful bunt single, advanced on an error, and then moved to third on a Chris Nelson sacrifice bunt. Then, as boos rained down from the Citi Field faithful fans, he scored on a past ball. The Rockies would add an insurance run in the 9th and Rafael Betancourt closed out the win.

White continues to show signs of promise in the piggyback paired pitching system thing. As time wears on, it will be interesting to see if he continues to develop once the organization takes off the training wheels. It is hard to imagine that this four man rotation is a good idea, but some of the young pitchers seem to be responding. With that happening, one presumes that Adam Ottavino‘s arm will have to physically fall off of his body from overuse for O’Dowd and Co. to even consider switching back to a conventional rotation.

Jhoulys Chacin will take his turn in the system tonight in what will surely be a closely monitored start. He will face former Padres great Chris Young.