The Pittsburgh Pirates are playing for October.
The reeling Rockies are playing for 2016. Or 2017. Or, well, you get the picture.
The playoff-bound Pirates rallied late to beat the Rockies 5-4 Thursday afternoon at Coors Field, completing a four-game sweep and notching their sixth consecutive victory. Their hopes of catching St. Louis and winning the National League Central title remain very much alive.
The Rockies were swept at home in a four-game series for the first time since Sept. 15-18, 2011, vs. San Francisco. Manager Walt Weiss early this season said the Rockies’ goal must be to win at least 50 games in their home ballpark, but with Thursday’s loss, they tumbled to 33-45.
Two prime players for Colorado’s future were on display Thursday. One, right-handed starter Chad Bettis, fared very well. The other, hard-throwing rookie reliever Jairo Diaz, not so well.
The Rockies took a 4-2 lead into the eighth, but Diaz gave up singles to Starling Marte and Neil Walker and then cringed as Pedro Alvarez hit a screaming, two-out, line-drive, three-run homer into the Rockies’ bullpen beyond right field.
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“I tried to stay down and away on the pitch (to Alvarez), but I left the ball over the middle,” said Diaz, now 0-1 with a 3.00 ERA.
Weiss had lefty specialist Boone Logan ready in the bullpen to pitch to the left-handed hitting Alvarez, but Weiss stuck with the right-handed Diaz.
“Jairo has been our guy in the eighth inning; he’s been lights out,” Weiss said. “He’s been better against lefties than righties.”
Diaz entered the game with left-handers hitting .182 against him, while right-handers were hitting .258. Then again, Alvarez has hit 113 career homers off right-handers vs. just 17 off lefties.
However, Weiss also defended his non-move by saying that if he had brought in Logan, the Pirates probably would have brought in a right-handed bat off the bench.
“Logan is not going to face Alvarez,” Weiss said. “They are going to pull him back. They’ve got (Michael) Morse and possibly (Aramis) Ramirez. Ramirez is nicked up, but possibly available. I can’t assume that he’s not.
“So if I pull the string right there and get Logan, it gives (the Pirates) the upper hand in matchup for the next two hitters, because they have (Gregory) Polanco sitting over there, too.”
The bottom line is that Diaz failed to get the job done, once again highlighting the shortcomings of a bullpen with an NL-worst 4.75 ERA. It’s a major reason why the Rockies own a 63-90 record, the third time in four years they have lost at least 90 games.
Bettis, meanwhile, continues his maturation into a dependable and effective starter.
He gave the Rockies six strong innings, lowering his ERA to 4.38. The Pirates nicked him for two runs on seven hits. He whiffed six.
“I felt in control, but I wanted to be a little bit more efficient, and possibly go out there for the seventh inning,” said Bettis, who threw 97 pitches, 58 for strikes.
Bettis appears to have locked up a spot in the 2016 starting rotation.
“He’s always had that great mentality to stay calm out there,” Weiss said. “He always competes, and he always has strong body language out there.”
Patrick Saunders: psaunders@denverpost.com or @psaundersdp
