MIAMI — For four glorious innings, Ubaldo Jimenez was dealing like it was last April, not this one. He wasn’t retiring hitters so much as demoralizing them, sending them back to the dugout with a scowl and a shake of the head that served as the snapshot of the early stages of his 2010 season.
And then, in the span of four hitters, the reality of 2011 came calling.
“That last inning, I ran a little bit out of gas,” Jimenez said. “I was trying to get my velocity back, but it wasn’t there because I was a little tired. The first four innings, I felt great. I let it go. It’s been awhile since I let it go for that long.”
Jimenez had long since retired to the dugout Sunday when Matt Belisle served up a mammoth three-run homer to Mike Stanton in the eighth inning to give the Marlins a 6-3 victory at Sun Life Stadium. At one point, it looked like one run might win it, what with Jimenez and fellow 2010 all-star Josh Johnson locked in a classic pitchers’ duel.
“I looked up and there were a lot of zeroes,” Johnson said. “I was like, ‘Yeah, this is what everybody wanted.’ “
Neither pitcher allowed a hit in the first four innings. As the fifth played out, there had been 156 pitches thrown without a ball landing safely on the field. Just then, the 83-degree heat and the down time Jimenez spent on the 15-day disabled list caught up with him.
“Everything was good,” Jimenez said. “I felt like my old self. I was throwing the breaking ball for strikes, and my velocity was good. I just got tired. I haven’t been pitching like the rest of the guys every five days. I’m working my way back.”
Jimenez walked his first three hitters in the fifth, but was within an out of escaping after striking out Johnson and inducing a popup from Chris Coghlan. That’s when Omar Infante lined a fastball into the gap in right-center for a three-run triple.
The Rockies rallied to tie it at 3-3, scoring a run off Johnson in the sixth on back-to-back doubles by Dexter Fowler and Jonathan Herrera and adding two more in the eighth against Clay Hensley, the tying run scoring on Troy Tulowitzki’s two-out double.
“We battled like you’d like to see a club battle,” Rockies manager Jim Tracy said. “The bottom line boils down to this: bases on balls. When an opposing team gets six runs on three hits, obviously there was something to set the stage. Either you played poorly defensively and created opportunity or you didn’t get a chance to catch the ball.”
Jimenez allowed three runs in five innings despite striking out seven and allowing one hit. The Marlins got only two more hits, both in the eighth, but Stanton’s home run over the bleachers in left field cost the Rockies the game, dropping their record to 14-7.
Belisle had two outs before walking Gaby Sanchez to put runners on first and second, bringing pitching coach Bob Apodaca to the mound. Apodaca had barely returned to the dugout when Belisle served up a hanging slider that Stanton crushed to give the Marlins their 13th win in 20 games.
“When you don’t execute pitches in big situations, big-league hitters hurt you,” Belisle said.
“That was a sloppy slider in a hitter’s count and he tanked it. I’ll take this on my shoulders, but what we do now is turn the page.”
Jim Armstrong: 303-954-1269 or jmarmstrong@denverpost.com
Looking ahead
MONDAY: Rockies at Cubs, 6:05 p.m., Root
Assuming they play this one — the weather forecast in Chicago is, in a word, daunting — Esmil Rogers (2-1, 6.75 ERA) will try to bounce back from a nightmarish performance vs. the Giants. He allowed five runs in the first inning, including back-to-back home runs. Matt Garza (0-2, 4.74) has been a mystery since being acquired from Tampa Bay. He has struck out 34 hitters in 24 2/3 innings, but has allowed 33 hits. He has the typical repertoire of breaking pitches, but lives off his two-seam and four-seam fastballs. He typically sits at 92-93 mph, but can ride his four-seamer up to 96. Jim Armstrong, The Denver Post
Upcoming pitching matchups
Tuesday: Rockies’ Jorge De La Rosa (3-0, 3.00 ERA) vs. Cubs’ James Russell (1-2, 8.00), 6:05 p.m., Root
Wednesday: Rockies’ Jhoulys Chacin (3-1, 2.67) vs. Cubs’ Casey Coleman (1-1, 7.43), 12:20 p.m., Root
Thursday: Off
Friday: Pirates’ Kevin Correia (3-2, 3.48) vs. Rockies’ Jason Hammel (2-1, 3.80), 6:40 p.m., Root
