Houston – No, it’s not pulp fiction. The Rockies won a game Saturday night at Minute Maid Park.
Behind the stellar work of starter Aaron Cook and relievers Ramon Ramirez and Brian Fuentes, the Rockies defeated the Houston Astros 2-1.
As games early in the season go, it was a big win. It not only ended the Rockies’ three-game skid, it snapped their seven- game losing streak at Minute Maid dating to April 3, 2003.
After getting hammered 12-2 on Friday night, the Rockies desperately needed a quality performance from Cook. The sinkerball specialist delivered, allowing the Astros just one run on five hits and striking out six in 6 1/3 innings.
“Aaron Cook stood up and performed,” Rockies manager Clint Hurdle said. “That’s just a gutsy performance and we needed one.”
Cook outdueled the Astros’ Roy Oswalt, who gave up just two runs on eight hits but saw his six-game home winning streak halted.
“You know what you are going to get out of Oswalt,” Cook said. “You know he’s going to be consistent and keep his team in the game. I knew I had to go out there and do just as well as him, if not better.”
Cook beat Houston for the second time in a week. Last Sunday, he allowed two runs on six hits in eight innings in the Rockies’ 5-3 victory at Coors Field. But it’s on the road where Cook has been nearly unbeatable. Since 2004, he’s 10-1 away from home in 18 starts.
The win kept the Rockies (21-16) in a first-place tie with San Diego in the National League West. The Padres won in dramatic fashion earlier in the day, beating the Chicago Cubs 4-3 on Mike Piazza’s three-run homer in the ninth. It was San Diego’s 13th win in 14 games.
Hurdle has called Ramirez, a baby- faced 24-year-old rookie, the most pleasant surprise of the season. Fellow reliever Ray King has taken to calling Ramirez “Cy,” as in Cy Young. But Ramirez has come through in the clutch so often this season, it’s no longer a surprise for him to win the biggest showdown of the night.
The drama unfolded at the end of the seventh inning Saturday. With two out, Houston’s Adam Everett on third and the dangerous Craig Biggio at the plate, the Rockies called in Ramirez from the bullpen to rescue them. He did, getting Biggio to line out to third baseman Garrett Atkins to end the threat.
“I thought it might be a hit because he hit it so hard,” Ramirez said.
In the eighth, Ramirez set the Astros down in order, striking out cleanup hitter Morgan Ensberg with a wicked breaking ball to end the inning. It was Ensberg who hit a three-run homer Friday to spark Houston’s rout.
“I felt good, I felt very comfortable coming into that situation,” Ramirez said.
About his decision to go with Ramirez in one of the most pressure-packed games of the season, Hurdle said, “We just wanted to go with the hot hand. … He’s coming in throwing up zero after zero.”
Ramirez has pitched 15 1/3 scoreless innings, a Rockies record for the longest scoreless streak by a relief pitcher to begin his big-league career.
“That makes you special,” Hurdle said. “You do it for a long time, that makes you really good or great.”
The ninth inning was anticlimactic, as Fuentes set down the Astros 1-2-3 in workmanlike fashion for his ninth save in 10 chances.
The Rockies scored both of their runs in the third inning, stringing together a double by Danny Ardoin, a sacrifice bunt by Cook, a walk by Cory Sullivan and run-scoring singles by Luis Gonzalez and Todd Helton.
Staff writer Patrick Saunders can be reached at 303-820-5459 or psaunders@denverpost.com.
