The Colorado Rockies continued their winning streak on Wednesday by sweeping the San Diego Padres in their first series win away this season. This is two series sweeps in a row, first against the Texas Rangers, for the Rockies after a troubled opening to the 2024 season. While the Rockies are still 13 games back in the national League West, Colorado has stemmed the slide backwards for now. The upcoming series against the San Franscisco Giants could give the Rockies a chance to close the current 4-game gap in the standings between these two teams.
Two factors that stand out in this winning streak for the Rockies are the starting pitchers and the hitting numbers. Generally, the Rockies starting pitchers have recently been preventing the large early deficits that were undermining the team’s ability to win games because it was putting them in deep hole that the offense could not dig out of. However, by holding the opposing teams to no runs, or very few, the Rockies starting pitching rotation has set the stage for the offense to deliver runs and wins.
Leading the way as a common leadoff batter is Ezequiel Tovar. In the last seven games, Tovar has had 31 at bats, hit 2 homeruns, 5 RBIs, and stolen 1 base, while slashing .355/.355/.742. Charlie Blackmon has also taken turns in the leadoff spot as the designated hitter, and he has delivered some clutch performances at the plate during this streak. Blackmon had 28 at bats in the last seven games, which included 7 RBIs and a stolen base. Blackmon has come out of a recent slump and raised his slash to .286/.333/.464 for these seven games.
More notable batting performances have come from Ryan McMahon, Brenton Doyle, and Jacob Stallings. For these seven games, McMahon has faced 28 at bats and delivered 1 homerun, 3 RBIs and slashed .357/.379/.500. While McMahon has not had a runaway inflation of his numbers, he has been instrumental at key moments like when he hit the homerun that started the batting frenzy against the Padres on Tuesday. McMahon is not single-handedly having a great streak, but he is keeping the innings going at key moments.
Another contributor that has been showing up with inspiration to keep this streak going is Doyle. In the last seven games Doyle has doubled his stolen bases for the year to bring his season total to 8. At a fourth of the way into the season, Doyle is already viewed as a threat on the bags and will probably crest 25 stolen bases for this season. In addition to his contribution on the base paths, Doyle has hit 2 homeruns and 5 RBIs in the last seven games, and he slashed .348/.464/.696.
On Defense, Brendon Rodgers and Jake Cave have been making diving catches that seem to be expressing their willingness to lead from the front when showing what a veteran can do on the field. Their performances couple well with Jordan Beck’s rookie performance that seems to show he is taking good notes from the veterans. Beck joined the big league just over two weeks ago and has already put up 1 homer and 6 RBIs, with .304/.304/.478 in the last seven games in addition to plenty of good catches proving that he deserves to be here. With all these pieces fitting together to produce wins, most fans are wondering what Bud Black is planning for Kris Bryant’s and Kyle Freeland’s returns in a couple weeks. Many criticize the Rockies starting roster for being a logjam of mediocre veterans blocking the way for young talent to come up the ranks. This last 7-game streak seems to be giving credit to the idea that the Rockies franchise has some great talents on the farm, and they can win games if they continue to find ways to get fresh talent onto the active roster
