Thursday’s First Pitch

Leading Off
In a word, dominant.

Ubaldo Jimenez got his first win of 2011, and he did it in an impressive fashion. The Rockies finally got back from the vacation they apparently took over the month of May, and opened up June with an impressive 3-0 win over the Dodgers in Los Angeles on Wednesday night. The Rockies move back into sole possession of third place, 4.5 games behind the Diamondbacks, who walked off the Marlins in Phoenix Wednesday night.

The Rockies needed this one. Badly.

The Good Great

The streak is over. Ubaldo Jimenez was absolutely lights-out on Wednesday. He looked like the Ubaldo Jimenez of April/May/June of 2010, not the Ubaldo that hasn’t won a game since September 17th. That’s not the case anymore, as Ubaldo earned his first win of 2011, throwing a very impressive complete game shutout, just the second one thrown by a Rockies hurler all-time. The first one was thrown by Jason Marquis in a two-hit shutout on June 30, 2009. Jimenez sent down 9 in a row before giving up a single to Rafael Furcal in the bottom of the ninth. Here’s his line –  9.0 innings pitched, 4 hits, 0 runs, 0 walks, and seven strikeouts. He did it on just 106 pitches, and he lowered his ERA to under 5 for the first time since Opening Day.

Jimenez never even came close to walking a batter, and the Dodgers didn’t see second base until the bottom of the ninth inning with one out.

The Bad
Can you really find something to go here? If anything, it might have been Jonathan Herrera. It wasn’t terrible, but Johnny Sparkplug fizzled a bit Tuesday, going 0-for-4. Everyone else (Save for Jimenez, but that’s not really his job, is it?) had a hit,

including Todd Helton’s solo home run in the fourth inning, his seventh of the year. Helton is just one round-tripper away from tying his home run total from 2010. Other than Herrera’s lack of offense, it was tough to find a bad spot in the Rockies game against the Dodgers.

The Ugly
This is going to be ugly – for the other teams. With Ty Wigginton’s leadoff triple in the second inning, the Rockies now lead all of Major League Baseball with 14 team triples. Thanks to speedsters like Dexter Fowler and Carlos Gonzalez, the Rockies can build on this crucial and exciting offensive category and

On Deck
Coming today is your usual Battery (expect it this afternoon) the regular Matchup, coming about 6pm Mountain time, and perhaps a feature on Jimenez coming either this afternoon or sometime Friday.