Colorado Rockies: German Marquez saves the weekend in multiple ways

On Sunday afternoon, the Colorado Rockies beat the Baltimore Orioles in walk-off fashion 8-7. Even though he wasn’t involved in the ninth-inning theatrics, the Rockies won in large part of the performance of starter German Marquez.

Colorado Rockies‘ starter German Marquez didnt have his sharpest outing on Sunday. However, he definitely helped the team win in more ways than one.

On the mound, Marquez went 6.1 innings and allowed four earned runs with four strikeouts. Pitching into the seventh was extremely helpful for the Rockies as it took some much-needed innings off the bullpen. In the previous three games, the bullpen had been overwhelmed with 13.2 innings of work and it showed as they struggled in the later innings on Sunday.

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At the plate is where Marquez really shined. He was 1-for-1 with a triple off the right field wall and 3 RBI, including a sacrifice bunt that drove in a run. Those RBI now give him nine for the month, which is the first time a pitcher has done that since St. Louis Cardinals pitcher Rick Wise did it in August of1973.

The most important thing about his performance Sunday was that it set up the Rockies for a series victory that they absolutely had to have. The Orioles, whose record dropped to 16-37, had entered the series having only won a total of three series the entire season and had lost six straight and nine of their last 10 ballgames.

Had the Rockies lost, they would have wasted a prime opportunity to get closer to evening their season record. More importantly, they would have started off on the wrong foot for a 10-game homestand of which they must take advantage.

Luckily, the Rockies now have some much needed momentum heading into their Memorial Day afternoon game against the Arizona Diamondbacks, who are coming off a sweep of the Giants.

Even though German Marquez was left with the no-decision, he put the Rockies in position to win a game that they desperately needed.