MIAMI — You hear it from major-leaguers all the time: “It’s a long season. This is just one game of 162.”
Fair enough.
But that does nothing to change the reality of the Rockies’ performance in a 6-0 loss to the Miami Marlins on Thursday night in front of an announced crowd of 18,003 at Marlins Park.
The Rockies were simply bad as they were shut out for the third time this season, Miami right-hander David Phelps pitching eight innings of four-hit ball.
Perhaps it was the cross-country flight that put them into Miami at 1:30 a.m., but the Rockies were a lifeless bunch.
“I guess the energy wasn’t as high as we would like,” third baseman Nolan Arenado said. “But (Phelps) pitched a great game. I mean, we battled but it just didn’t work out.”
Take left-hander Chris Rusin’s lackluster start and a sloppy error in right field by Carlos Gonzalez — along with a Colorado offense that managed just five total hits — and it equaled one of the worst games of the Rockies’ season.
Things were looking up when Colorado took two of three games from the mighty St. Louis Cardinals to finish the recent homestand, but that momentum is gone now. The Rockies slipped to 1-4 this season against a Marlins team floundering near the bottom of the National League East.
For all intents and purposes, Thursday’s game was over after Miami cleanup hitter Giancarlo Stanton launched a three-run homer in his first at-bat.
Saturday night in Colorado’s 10-5 victory over the Marlins at Coors Field, Stanton wore a golden sombrero as Rusin became the first pitcher to ever strike him out four times in a game.
Stanton wasted no time striking back Thursday. With Martin Prado and Christian Yelich perched on base, Stanton drove Rusin’s 3-1, 88-mph fastball on a string over the left-field fence.
“I just left that pitch up. … I left a lot of pitches up tonight, and they took advantage,” Rusin said.
Stanton is slugging at a torrid pace. It was his 22nd homer in just 60 games. By comparison, in 2012, when he finished with 37 homers, it took him 89 games to hit his 22nd home run.
Saturday, Rusin impressed in his first start in a Rockies uniform, allowing Miami two runs on seven hits over seven innings. He was a much different pitcher Thursday: six runs allowed on 11 hits in 5 innings. Former Rockie Jeff Baker also hit a homer off Rusin — a solo laser to left-center in the fifth.
“It usually comes down to how you control the ball and the location of pitches,” manager Walt Weiss said of Rusin. “He didn’t have the same command as his last few times out. He had a pretty good feel for the changeup, but the other pitches were pretty tough for him tonight.”
Phelps, by contrast, did a 180-degree turn in the positive direction. Saturday, the Rockies rocked him for nine runs on 11 hits in 3 innings.
“He was a totally different pitcher tonight,” Arenado said.
Said Weiss: “I think travel might have been a bit of a factor for us, but more of a factor was Phelps’ command. He had pinpoint command of his fastball and had a really good breaking ball. He was in total control of the game.”
CarGo’s error was symbolic of the Rockies’ evening. In the third, Donovan Solano hit a drive to right-center field and both CarGo and Charlie Blackmon gave chase. Gonzalez reached the ball on the run and casually flagged the ball with his glove, only to see it pop out for an error.
Patrick Saunders: psaunders@denverpost.com or
