Rockies match all-time record for worst 29-game start in MLB history, drilled once again

DENVER — Rockies Report, Game 29:

ROCKIES BOTTOM LINE: The 1988 Baltimore Orioles … the 2003 Detroit Tigers … and your 2025 Colorado Rockies.

These are the three teams in Major League Baseball’s modern era to begin a season with four wins in their first 29 games. Colorado joined this dubious club with its seventh consecutive defeat, this one by an 8-2 count to the Atlanta Braves in front of a Coors Field crowd announced at 19,010 on Tuesday night.

Colorado is 4-25.

One types those numbers and pauses. Little was expected of the 2025 Rockies beyond the hope of progress for a young core of players, and perhaps the hope that this team could avoid a third-straight 100-loss season. Growing pains were expected.

But this avalanche of defeats, with every color of the feel-bad rainbow represented over the course of an already-doomed season’s first month … this couldn’t have been forecast, not at the start of the season, certainly not after a 1-1 opening pair of games at Tampa Bay five weeks ago.

Unlike Monday’s 6-3 loss, in which Hunter Goodman briefly gave Colorado fans hope with a 3-run first-inning homer, Colorado fell behind early and never led. Atlanta took a 2-0 lead in the second inning on back-to-back RBI doubles by Sean Murphy and Michael Harris II.

Michael Toglia countered in the bottom of the frame with a 414-foot homer that he golfed over the right-field scoreboard, cutting the Rockies’ deficit in half. But from there, Atlanta dinked and dunked its way to eight runs, once again doing its damage without going yard.

Half of Atlanta’s runs came with two outs.

Emblematic of Colorado’s ongoing frustration were two errors, one of which led directly to Atlanta’s fifth-inning run. Playing right field, Mickey Moniak overshot the cutoff man following Ozzie Albies’ single, allowing Matt Olson to score after he had doubled two pitches earlier.

Shortstop Alan Trejo, filling in for the injured Ezequiel Tovar, also had a throwing error in the ninth inning.

Colorado also lost for the 16th time in 17 games — its first 1-16 run in club history.

Still, manager Bud Black said the clubhouse vibe remains strong, given the circumstances.

“The guys are hanging in there. It’s tough. Guys are frustrated, for sure … but the work ethic is fine,” Black said after the game. “Those guys are proud. They’re hanging in there. We’ve got a lot of young guys who are wanting to prove they belong.

“… Guys are coming to fight. We’re just not getting the results overall from all 26 guys.”

STARTER’S REPORT: There was no relief for Germán Márquez, who avoided death by longball against the Atlanta Braves, but was done in by a series of soft Atlanta hits, a 65-foot dribbler up the first-base line, a throwing error and an Atlanta lineup that he could strike out just once in 5 1/3 innings.

Márquez surrendered 11 hits and a walk in 5 1/3 innings, dropping to 0-5. He had a 1-2-3 inning in the third, but as was the case for Ryan Feltner on Monday night, endured death by paper cuts.

IT WAS DECIDED FOR THE ROCKIES WHEN: Atlanta reliever Enyel de los Santos — who came in for starter A.J. Smith-Shawver in the sixth inning after a Ryan McMahon line drive drilled Smith-Shawver’s elbow, forcing him from the game after just 59 pitches — escaped from a two-on, two-out jam by getting Moniak to ground out to first baseman Matt Olson.

With that, the Rockies’ best chance of mounting a comeback died. The Rockies went down 1-2-3 in the seventh and eighth, going quietly once again into the cool Colorado night as they sealed yet another series loss.

“We gotta right the ship on the rotation first of all to give us a chance in the early part of the game to maybe get some momentum offensively,” Black said.

WHAT’S NEXT: Rookie Chase Dollander will try to salvage a win from the homestand in a getaway-day contest. Atlanta counters with reigning Cy Young Award winner Chris Sale, who is off to a ragged start to the campaign; he has a 5.40 ERA and no quality starts in six trips to the mound so far this season.

First pitch is scheduled for 1:10 p.m. Wednesday.

Here is cause for optimism: The Rockies are 2-0 in the final games of homestands this season. It’s the one scenario so far this year in which they’ve been successful.

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