Colorado Rockies: Four Players Who Shined in Saturday’s Win

It wasn’t easy, but the Colorado Rockies gained a measure of revenge on Saturday afternoon against the San Diego Padres.

Still stinging from a San Diego ninth-inning rally on Friday night, Colorado used another strong effort on the mound from Tyler Chatwood and home runs from Carlos Gonzalez and Charlie Blackmon to log a 5-3 decision over the Padres and even the three-game series.

Chatwood and Gonzalez were certainly two stars of the day for Colorado, but two other players had key roles in the victory as well. Let’s take a look at four players who made a big difference in Saturday afternoon’s win.

Carlos Gonzalez

Once again on Saturday, CarGo equated into CarGone.

After the Padres grabbed a 2-0 lead in the bottom of the first, Gonzalez gave the Rockies a big boost, blasting the first pitch he saw from Erik Johnson just over the scoreboard in right-center to give the Rockies a 3-2 edge.

After going 2-for-32 (.063) from May 10-21, CarGo has been on fire. He’s hit safely in 15 of his last 18 games and has a homer in eight of his past 15 contests. He’s also logged an RBI in 10 of those 15 games.

Since May 23, CarGo has nine homers and 21 RBI.

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Including a fifth-inning bloop single that plated DJ LeMahieu, CarGo finished the day 2-for-4 with four RBI.

Tyler Chatwood

After allowing one hit over eight innings in a victory over the Los Angeles Dodgers, it was going to be hard for Chatwood to top that on Saturday. However, he did enough to give the Rockies a chance to win, scattering six hits over 6.2 innings in a 92-pitch performance.

The day didn’t start out the best for Chatwood as San Diego tagged him for two runs in the bottom of the first, but he settled down from there to earn the victory.

One of the day’s more amazing stats for Chatwood shows just how on top of his pitching he was on Saturday. Of the 14 outs he registered, all 14 came on the ground.

In his career, he’s now 3-0 against the Padres, including 2-0 this season.

Chatwood even went for 1-for-3 at the plate, with a single accounting for his first hit since a May 15 start against the Mets.

Boone Logan

Another game, another chance for Logan to remind us how valuable he is coming out of the bullpen.

After Chatwood retired the first two batters in the seventh, Derek Norris singled on a 2-2 pitch to bring the tying run to the plate in the form of Alexi Amarista. Colorado manager Walt Weiss decided to bring in Logan and the decision paid off.

Logan struck Amarista out on four pitches to end the threat and preserve Colorado’s 5-3 advantage.

Opening the eighth, Logan struck out Hector Sanchez and induced Jon Jay into a harmless fly ball before being relieved by Jason Motte.

The two strikeouts were the most Logan had registered since working an inning against the San Francisco Giants on May 8.

Carlos Estevez

Let the battle for the Colorado Rockies closer position officially begin.

With Jason Motte allowing a Jeff Kemp double and plunking Brett Wallace to open the ninth, the Padres looked as if they might have more late-inning magic in them. Weiss turned to Estevez to squash the rally and that’s just what he did.

In earning his first MLB save, Estevez retired the first two batters he faced then watched as Dustin Garneau threw out pinch runner Travis Jankowski to end the game.

Next: Tyler Anderson to Debut as Jake McGee Hits DL

With Jake McGee on the disabled list, did Estevez just push past him and secure his role as Colorado’s closer? Only time will tell, but Saturday was a good start toward that.