In this second to last game of the season, the Colorado Rockies don’t have much left to accomplish, except survive these last two games without further embarrassment, and work on improving the bullpen in the offseason. The batting title is DJ LeMahieu‘s to lose at this point with Daniel Murphy out for the rest of the year. Additionally, Nolan Arenado added to his statistical monster of a year by going yard and adding two more RBI’s and a homer to his totals.
In the first, Colorado picked up four hits, and Arenado hit a two-run bomb to dead center for his 41st homer of the year. The second inning yielded another run for the Rockies, as Charlie Blackmon drove in Daniel Descalso from second.
Nick Hundley continued his second half success by driving in Arenado in the third and boosting the Rox lead to 4-0. David Dahl showed that he is more than a good hitter by gunning down Chris Carter at the plate. In the top of the sixth Carter was trying to go from second to home, and Dahl one-hopped it perfectly into a waiting Hundley at home. Nothing of consequence happened for the rest of the game with both sides trading quiet innings and solid pitching.
Chad Bettis was on his game for his last appearance of the season, making it through the first three innings, and only giving up two hits. In the fourth inning, Bettis ran into a little bit of trouble giving up a huge home run to right center to Carter, making the score 4-1, and a double to the left field gap. In the top of the sixth, Bettis gave up three hits and a walk but managed to escape the jam unscathed.
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After a solid six innings, Bettis came out after giving up eight hits, one run and striking out five. After Bettis left, Carlos Estevez came in and worked the remainder of the seventh and the eighth innings. He continued the good pitching and then handed off the reigns to Adam Ottavino to close the game.
Sep 24, 2016; Los Angeles, CA, USA; Colorado Rockies starting pitcher Chad Bettis (35) throws in the fourth inning against the Los Angeles Dodgers at Dodger Stadium. Mandatory Credit: Jayne Kamin-Oncea-USA TODAY Sports
Here are a couple of more takeaways from the game:
1.) DJ’s chase to the Batting Title
DJ started out the game with a .349 batting average, which would make him the NL batting champion for this season. It would also mean that the Rockies bring home this honor for the third time in last four years. In the first, DJ got on base due to a fielder’s choice, which dropped his average to .348. In the second, he hit a pop fly down the right field line which didn’t do anything to his average either direction. After not picking up a hit in his first two at-bats, LeMahieu was pulled in the fourth inning to preserve his title. There is no word as to if he will play tomorrow night or not.
2. Rockies bats die off
This is something that needs to be addressed. In yesterday’s game against the Giants and tonight’s game, the Rockies started off with hot bats, but they quickly cooled. Perhaps this is something that hitting coaches and players need to work on during the offseason.
Luckily for us, pitching was able to hold up and preserve the lead.
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