Outmuscled: Yankees vs Rockies series recap

The Yankees rolled into Coors Field for a two game matchup with the Colorado Rockies.  This would be the Yankees first trip to the Mile High city since 2013.  The team was coming off of a series loss to the Tigers over the weekend in which the offense did a disappearing act in the two losses.  The altitude hints at the idea of offensive fireworks.  Hopefully, it will help jumpstart the offense. One in which a 7 run inning is not enough

Nathan Eovaldi went to the mound to try to smooth the rough edges from consecutive poor starts.  Unfortunately, he was in the wrong National League park for that to happen.  The Rockies would take a 1-0 lead into the fourth inning and would proceed to put up a 4-spot fueled by back-to-back home runs.  Eovaldi would give up 8 hits and 6 runs in 4+ innings of work.  He has now given up at least five runs in the last three starts and his ERA is pushing close to 5.00 on the season.  The Rockies would then get in a little batting practice in the sixth and seventh innings, scoring 6 runs off of Kirby Yates and Richard Bleier. Somehow, the Yankees couldn't get anything going in five innings against Rockies starter Jorge De La Rosa.  De La Rosa came into the game with an 8.81 ERA, but managed to keep the Yankees off of the scoreboard, while allowing three hits and two walks.  The Rockies bullpen was a different story, however.

Down 6-0 after six, the Yankees would score three in the sixth.  The damage was courtesy of a Didi Gregorius home run.  The Rockies would pull ahead 12-3 going into the eighth inning, but this one was far from over.  The Yankees would string together hit after hit off of three Rockies relievers to score seven runs on eight singles.  There was also an error and hit-by-pitch mixed in as well.  Unfortunately, it was too little, too late and the Rockies would end up winning by a final score of 13-10.  Typical Coors Field game I suppose. You had to figure that in a game in which every Yankee starting position player had a hit AND they scored seven runs in one inning, the odds were in their favor to pull out a win.  It was not to be on Tuesday as Eovaldi and the mop up boys in the bullpen couldn't stop the Rockies offense.  It will be a quick turnaround time for the second game of the short series as game time is mid afternoon. That was fast

Ivan Nova would try to slow down the Rockies as the two teams played a day game after a night game in the quick series.  The Yankees lineup almost had a Spring Training feel to it as Joe Girardi would give several players the afternoon off and shuffle several players higher into the batting order. Nova wiggled out of trouble several times early in the ballgame, but the Yankees scored on an RBI single and an error in the fourth inning to take a 2-1 lead.  The fifth inning would be his undoing however.  The Rockies would put together  a 4-run inning highlighted by Nolan Arenado's two-run homer.  Nova would end up giving up 10 hits and 5 runs in those 5 innings.  Nova has come back down to earth in his past few starts and it all begins with his ground ball rate.  His ERA in his last three games has ballooned to 6.75 as he has given up 23 hits in 17.2 innings pitched.  Opponents are batting .319 against him in that span. Other than the fourth inning, the offense never got in any kind of groove as they were hitless through the first three innings against Rockies starter Chad Bettis.  Yep, the same Chad Bettis with a 7.13 ERA in his last seven starts.  He would manage to go six innings in this one and their bullpen managed to keep things together in the end as the Rockies won 6-3. Not a whole lot of good to come out of these two games.  The team had to be thinking of making up some ground headed to Colorado and Minnesota, but I guess that's why they play the games.  The Yankees will visit the Twins for four games over the weekend.