Reds at Rockies
The Colorado Rockies watched the bats go cold at the end of a nine-game road trip and will hope for a change in temperature when they return home Friday to host the Cincinnati Reds. The Rockies dropped four of the final five games on the trek, capped by a 3-0 shutout at the Los Angeles Dodgers on Wednesday.
Colorado dropped five of nine on its road trip and is concerned about the hitting heading back home. "You want to do better, obviously," Rockies manager Bud Black told reporters of the trip. "We didn’t play our best baseball every time. I thought we pitched really well. We strung together some innings, offensively, to win us some games. We played solid defense throughout the road trip. We just didn’t hit well in certain games. ... We need to swing the bats better, for sure." The Reds capped a seven-game homestand with a series win over the Pittsburgh Pirates, taking Thursday's finale 5-4 behind Eugenio Suarez's grand slam. Suarez is 1-for-4 in his career against Colorado right-hander Jon Gray, who opposes Cincinnati's Sal Romano on Friday.
TV: 8:40 p.m. ET, FS Ohio (Cincinnati), AT&T SportsNet Rocky Mountain (Colorado)
PITCHING MATCHUP: Reds RH Sal Romano (2-5, 5.62 ERA) vs. Rockies RH Jon Gray (4-6, 5.34)
Romano put together a string of five straight starts allowing two or fewer earned runs bridging April and May but was not quite as strong in his last two turns. The 24-year-old was ripped for a total of 13 runs on 14 hits and eight walks over 7 1/3 innings in those two outings - both losses. Romano won his lone start against Colorado in his 2017 rookie campaign, earning his victory as a big-leaguer after allowing two runs and six hits in five frames.
Gray ran into similar trouble in his last two starts, surrendering a total of 11 runs and 19 hits over nine innings in losses to Milwaukee and San Francisco. The Oklahoma native did manage to strike out 14 in those nine frames and owns 63 strikeouts in 55 2/3 total innings. Gray saw Cincinnati once in 2017 and earned a win while yielding three runs - two earned - across 5 2/3 innings.
WALK-OFFS
1. Rockies 3B Nolan Arenado is 1-for-10 with six strikeouts in his last three games.
2. Cincinnati 1B Joey Votto is 5-for-27 over his last nine games.
3. Colorado CF Charlie Blackmon leads the team with 12 home runs but managed just one in the last 17 games.