DENVER — Happens to the best of ‘em.
Runners stranded in scoring position. Hitters chasing, squandering chances, failing to support a pitcher fighting without his best stuff. A reliever off the mark, his few mistakes a few too many.
All adding up to a loss. Rare and deserved.
For just the fifth time in 20 games so far this season, the Dodgers came out on the wrong end of the ledger, losing 4-3 to the Colorado Rockies on Saturday before a blue-and-purple crowd of 47,925 at Coors Field.
Dodgers catcher Dalton Rushing follows the flight of his solo home run off Colorado pitcher Ryan Feltner Saturday in Denver.
(David Zalubowski / Associated Press)
“Up to this point with runners in scoring position, we’ve been able to — whether it be earn a walk or swing at good pitches — get hits,” Dodger manager Dave Roberts said. “Today it just seemed like we chased a lot more than we have.”
Kyle Tucker, the Dodgers’ new $240-million man, had his second three-hit game this season — but he scored only once, in the first inning, on his 435-foot two-run home run into the second deck.
Freddie Freeman went two for three, including a triple, but he was stranded both times he reached.
And Shohei Ohtani made more history — he extended his career-best consecutive on-base record to 50 games with a ninth-inning single to tie Willie Keeler’s 1901 mark for third in franchise history — but he also scored only once, having reached on an error before Tucker’s first-inning homer.
In all, the Dodgers left eight runners on base — including Ohtani and Will Smith in the ninth — and went 0 for 7 with runners in scoring position.
“I mean, it happens at times,” said Tucker, who jumped on pitches early in counts Saturday in an attempt to build a consistent rhythm from at-bat to at-bat, game to game.
“We’re facing big league pitchers and they got some guys in their bullpen that can pitch really well. But at the same time, we gotta do our part. We had some opportunities with guys on base, especially late. Just gotta find ways to get hits or just get those guys in. Happens at times, but we just gotta do a better job at it.”
These were atypical postgame lamentations for the Dodgers, whose steamroll hit a speed bump as they lost for the first time all season to a National League opponent.
Starter Emmet Sheehan wasn’t as sharp as in his prior outing, but he left after five innings with a one-run lead, having thrown 77 pitches, giving up four hits and two runs with four strikeouts and two walks.
“I think last time we made a lot of progress on mechanical stuff,” said Sheehan, who gave up two runs in the first two innings but then held the Rockies at bay. His best inning was his final one, the 1-2-3, nine-pitch fifth.
“Definitely happy with some of the pitches I made later, but I got to be better earlier in the game,” Sheehan said.
Dalton Rushing concurred.
“He fought, he showed how tough he is out there,” said Rushing, the Dodgers’ hot-and hard-hitting backup catcher who got the start. “He didn’t have his best stuff. He knew that. He knew he was going to have to pivot a little bit, figure some things out. I’ll give it to him. He grinded out there. But there’s some things we can work on, both us, about understanding a game plan. But overall I’m proud of the way he grinded.
“Obviously I’m not proud of the result. We lost a baseball game. But at the same time I think there was some good coming out of the grinding.”
Rushing’s only hit Saturday was a 371-foot solo home run in the second inning that gave the Dodgers a 3-1 lead that lasted until reliever Will Klein gave up three consecutive hits and two runs — and the one-run lead he was staked — in the sixth inning.
“I thought tonight his sweeper, the feel for spin wasn’t good,” Roberts said. “He didn’t have it and I think a couple of those hits early were just cement mixers that just didn’t do anything.”
Right-hander Roki Sasaki (0-2, 6.23) is scheduled to take the mound for the Dodgers in the famously hitter-friendly ballpark for a 1:10 p.m. game Sunday. Right-hander Michael Lorenzen (1-2, 8.10) is scheduled to start for the Rockies.
Treinen is fine
Dodgers reliever Blake Treinen was struck by a batted ball while he was in the bullpen before the game, but he said afterward that he was “fine.”
The Dodgers’ right-handed reliever said he didn’t experience any concussion-like symptoms and could have come on to pitch after being tested to ensure he did not, in fact, have a concussion.
