Dereck Rodriguez’s Major League debut should be a long-term takeaway from Tuesday night’s game, but for now, it’s just a blip in the sixth loss in the last seven games for the San Francisco Giants, who fell 11-4 to the Colorado Rockies.
The son of Hall-of-Fame catcher Ivan Rodriguez was called on sooner than expected, as starter Jeff Samardzija left after just one inning with a tight shoulder. Samardzija’s fastball sat at 91 mph, and he was seen snapping a bat over his leg in frustration after being taken out.
Rodriguez ended up allowing four runs in 3 1/3 innings — including an RBI groundout from Nolan Arenado and a Trevor Story triple — but only one of those runs was earned, by virtue of sloppy defense.
San Francisco (25-30) made four errors, three of which came from Kelby Tomlinson. After a fourth-inning double by Rockies pitcher Kyle Freeland, a Tomlinson error plus a throwing error by Brandon Belt allowed Freeland to score and got Charlie Blackmon all the way to third. Back-to-back doubles by Gerardo Parra and Arenado would make it 5-0. Rodríguez would channel his father, knocking in a run himself with a double, but after a sharp liner off the leg from Ian Desmond, Rodriguez would leave the game. X-rays came back negative. Desmond would later score on a Chris Iannetta sac fly against Will Smith.
Cory Gearrin allowed four runs in the seventh on a Desmond double, an Iannetta single and a two-run homer by David Dahl to stretch the lead to 10-3. Colorado (30-25) would tack on another run in the eighth when Carlos Gonzalez singled off Ty Blach, who was moved to the bullpen.
Mac Williamson doubled twice and Evan Longoria hit a pair of homers — one off Freeland and one off Bryan Shaw. Freeland allowed three runs in 5 1/3 innings on eight hits, but avoiding any walks. Scott Oberg, Mike Dunn, Shaw and Brooks Pounders combined to get the final 14 outs for the Rockies, with just Shaw allowing a run on Longoria’s second homer.
Longoria hit two of three San Francisco homers on the night; the other was Buster Posey’s third of the year, a sixth-inning blast off of Freeland. Longoria’s home run two batters later caused manager Bud Black to call on the bullpen.
Editor’s Note: An earlier version of this story incorrectly reported that pitcher Dereck Rodriguez snapped a bat over his leg during the game. Jeff Samardzija was the pitcher who snapped the bat.
