Blake St. Ball: Did we just see the turning point for the Colorado Rockies?

Sometimes all it takes is one game to get back on track.  It looks like for the second year in a row for the Colorado Rockies, that game may have come in San Francisco.

After an abysmal start to the season where it seemed nothing would go right for the Rockies, rising starting pitcher German Marquez delivered the best start of his young career, throwing 2019’s first complete game shutout.  The right-hander surrendered just one soft single in the eighth and walked none against 9 strikeouts.

Blake Street Ball discussed whether or not this game will turn out to be the turning point for the 2019 Rockies:

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What was so encouraging about this game was not just the start by Marquez but the at-bats the Rockies’ hitters put together.

It wasn’t just the fact that they finally scored a few runs, but the fact that the entire lineup gave their best at-bats of the season.  That trend continued into the brief two-game sweep of the new-look San Diego Padres.

For the first time all year, the Rockies’ hitters look comfortable at the plate.  Until that start by Marquez both the hitters and the pitchers looked like they were pressing too hard, like each player on the roster was taking it upon themselves to carry the team.  In that series finale in San Francisco, the Rockies just went out and played baseball.  The players didn’t try too hard to win the game by themselves. They played as a team, they played the way we expected them to when the season began.

It may take a few months before we can declare for sure if Marquez’s near no-hitter was the turning point for the Rockies, but one thing’s for sure: the team on the field right now looks like a completely different team than what we saw in the first few weeks of the season.