At Maryvale Baseball Park
It was a lousy, rainy Saturday afternoon for Rockies pitchers.
Tyler Anderson’s rough spring didn’t get any smoother when the Brewers knocked out four runs on five hits against him in three innings. True, only one run was earned, and he was hurt by a throwing error by shortstop Brendan Rodgers, but Anderson was not nearly as crisp as he wanted to be. His ERA is now 5.14.
”It was like going out for a jog and trying to run five or six miles, when you only meant to run one,” he said of a long first inning in which Milwaukee sent eight men to the plate. “I made a lot of bad pitches that were up, and (that’s) a pretty good offense. Sometimes there were flares that found spots, some were barrels that found spots.”
At times, Anderson’s changeup was effective, especially when he struck out Eric Thames in the first on a beautiful pitch.
” ‘Andy’ has to be down (in the zone) and up high enough. Today he was in that middle range,” manager Bud Black said.
On the mound: Right-hander Yency Almonte, a dark-horse candidate for the rotation, pitched an uneven 2 ⅓ innings, giving up three runs on five hits, but striking out three. … Reliever Bryan Shaw gave up his second homer of the spring, this one a solo blast that Domingo Santana scorched high off the batter’s eye in center field.
At the plate: Colorado was blanked until the seventh inning when outfielder David Dahl ripped a two-run triple into the right-field corner. Dahl, trying to earn a spot in the crowded outfield, began the Cactus League 0-for-15, but has three homers and is hitting .348 (8-for-23) since then.
Worth noting: Top prospect Rodgers played six innings at shortstop Saturday, and he now has 42 innings at shortstop and 33 at second base. It’s clear the Rockies are interested in giving him a long look at both spots.
Up next: The Rockies host the Dodgers at 2:10 p.m. (MDT) at Salt River Fields. The Rockies start right-hander German Márquez vs. Dodgers lefty Hyun-Jin Ryu.
