Colorado Rockies morning after: The Oracle House of Horrors continues

SAN FRANCISCO — It’s a different season with different faces in the Colorado Rockies lineup, but the results for Austin Gomber and the Rox felt eerily familiar at Oracle Park on Monday night.

After three road starts against the San Francisco Giants in 2021 resulted in a 12.00 ERA, Gomber suffered inside the same house of horrors on Monday night. San Francisco’s first batter, Austin Slater, hit a triple and would score on a sacrifice fly from the next batter, giving the Giants a quick 1-0 lead and the Colorado Rockies a feeling of “here we go again.”

Gomber would surrender three runs in the game’s first three innings and the Colorado offense couldn’t string together hits against San Francisco’s Carlos Rodón outside of a fifth-inning flurry.

As a result, the Colorado Rockies fell 8-5 to open a three-game series against the San Francisco Giants and continued a troublesome road trip where they have lost three of four contests.

It also extended Colorado’s woes in San Francisco, where the Rockies have dropped nine of their last 11 games at Oracle Park stretching back to the start of last season.

The Rockies ran up Rodón’s pitch count in the first inning, with the left-hander needing 30 pitches to navigate through the frame. However, the Rockies also struck out in order after Connor Joe’s leadoff single, a sign of things to come for Colorado against Rodón.

Rodón would bend but not break against the Rockies, striking out 12 as part of a 110-pitch performance. His fastball touched 98.1 mph and it was effective as he drew 23 swings and misses from Colorado batters during his six innings of work.

In all, Colorado struck out a season-high 16 times.

“He’s not leading the league in strikeouts (53 in all) for any reason other than his stuff. It’s legit,” Colorado manager Bud Black said of Rodón.

Gomber, meanwhile, surrendered five runs on five hits in 5.1 innings of work. He walked two, struck out three, and gave up a two-run homer to Mauricio Dubón in the third inning.

Those five hits were part of 11 total for the Giants on the night, marking the eighth straight game where Colorado has given up 10 or more hits to San Francisco. That tops the seven straight contests the Giants had 10 or more hits against the Boston Bees in 1940.

“Early on, I wasn’t very good, but I got better as the night went along,” Gomber said. “Early on, nothing was really sharp and I made some mistakes over the middle, but I think my body got better and my stuff got better as time went on.”

Colorado will look to turn things around on Tuesday when Antonio Senzatela (2-1, 3.75 ERA) squares off against Alex Wood (2-2, 4.38 ERA). First pitch is scheduled for 7:45 p.m. (Mountain time).

Note: Jose Iglesias went 3-for-4 out of the eight hole for the Rockies. Now on the season, he is batting 20-for-45 (.440) batting away from Coors Field.