Diamondbacks at Rockies
A successful homestand has vaulted the Colorado Rockies back to .500 for the first time since March 31, and they'll try to get over the hump when they go for a four-game sweep of the visiting Arizona Diamondbacks on Thursday afternoon. Colorado (27-27) prevailed 5-4 on Wednesday for its season-high fourth straight victory and is 5-1 on its 10-game stay at Coors Field.
Colorado's Nolan Arenado had an off-night Wednesday, going 1-for-3 with a run scored, but doesn't want May to end as he is batting .408 with nine home runs, 25 RBIs, 23 runs, seven doubles and one triple in the month. The Diamondbacks (28-28) have become a streaky bunch as they came to Denver off a weekend sweep of the Giants in San Francisco, which came on the heels of a five-game slide. Arizona's Taylor Clarke on Wednesday hopes to resume the promising start to his career when he opposes Kyle Freeland, who has struggled mightily this season after a breakout 2018 campaign. "Pitches (have) been fine,” Freeland told reporters after allowing seven runs in four innings of Colorado's 9-6 loss to Baltimore on Saturday. “It’s just the locations of those pitches in the zone, in the heart of the plate.”
TV: 3:10 p.m. ET, FS Arizona
PITCHING MATCHUP: Diamondbacks RH Taylor Clarke (1-1, 2.93 ERA) vs. Rockies LH Kyle Freeland (2-6, 6.71)
Clarke is 2-for-2 in quality-start attempts after allowing three runs, six hits and three walks in 6 1/3 innings of a 10-4 victory at San Francisco on Saturday. “It was a really, really strong outing because he didn’t have his best secondary stuff, and you would have never known it,” Arizona manager Torey Lovullo told reporters about the 26-year-old Virginian. Clarke, who was selected in the third round of the 2015 draft, won at Tampa Bay on May 7 in his first career start after pitching three innings of scoreless relief in his major-league debut on April 20 against the Cubs in Chicago.
Freeland went 17-7 with a 2.85 ERA last season, including a remarkable 10-2, 2.40 at Coors Field, and finished fourth in National League Cy Young Award voting. The 26-year-old native of Denver, however, is 1-3 with an 8.65 ERA in five home starts this season and has yielded 14 home runs in 11 turns after permitting 17 in each of the last two campaigns. Freeland permitted eight runs and nine hits in six innings of a 9-2 loss to Arizona on May 4, dropping him to 3-3, 4.81 in nine career starts against the Diamondbacks.
WALK-OFFS
1. Arizona had stolen 18 straight bases before PR Jarrod Dyson was thrown out on Wednesday, ending his 10-steal streak. The Diamondbacks lead baseball in stolen-base percentage at 87.9.
2. Colorado owns the worst ERA in the NL at 5.01.
3. The Diamondbacks have played the most one-run games in the majors and are 9-14 in such contests.