Rockies snap 11-game losing streak at Dodger Stadium

Rockies Report, Game 93:

ROCKIES BOTTOM LINE: Is Jordan Romano the answer the Rockies have sought at closer?

He certainly looked the part Tuesday night, sealing the Rockies’ first win at Dodger Stadium since 2024 by preserving a 4-3 lead, an edge Colorado earned through a determined eighth-inning rally. Romano earned his second save in as many opportunities, having closed out the team’s 7-6 win over the San Francisco Giants two days earlier.

The former Toronto Blue Jays All-Star closer joined the Rockies organization on May 5, agreeing to a minor-league deal after being released by the Los Angeles Angels of Anaheim after early-season struggles.

“He seems extremely calm. First couple of outings have looked really good,” Rockies manager Warren Schaeffer told media after the game.

Romano allowed the first two Dodgers he faced to reach base, but escaped despite staring down the top of the Dodgers order. First, he got Shohei Ohtani to pop up in the infield, breaking his bat in the process. Then he induced a harmless fly ball to right field from Andy Pages.

Finally, with the Dodger Stadium crowd chanting, “Fred-die, Fred-die” as first baseman Freddie Freeman strolled into the left-handed batter’s box, Romano caught the outside corner with his first pitch and the bottom of the zone with his second. Both were called balls by home-plate umpire Adam Beck, but Braxton Fulford successfully challenged both.

Freeman fouled off the third and fifth pitches — with an 0-2 ball in between — before getting Freeman to chase an inside slider.

With that, yet another Rockies late surge was preserved. The Rox lead MLB with 129 runs in the eighth inning or later, so their three-run eighth was no shock.

After mustering just one run against Los Angeles starter Justin Wrobleski, Dodgers reliever Will Klein issued a seven-pitch leadoff walk to Kyle Karros. And indeed, it came back to haunt them, as Karros would eventually score after a TJ Rumfield pop out, a Cole Carrigg single and a Miguel Rojas error that allowed Tyler Freeman to reach base and Karros to score.

With Carrigg on third and Freeman on first, Jake McCarthy executed a successful sacrifice bunt to score Carrigg. But Alex Freeland exacerbated matters for Los Angeles with an errant throw to third base. As the throw went wide, Freeman hustled into his head-first slide at third base, and when the ball bounced into the camera well off Freeman’s throw, he was awarded home plate, capping a three-run rally that nudged the Rockies in front to stay.

“T-Free, an incredible baserunning play to put pressure on. That’s what we want to do, and we got a good result from it,” Schaeffer said.

Oops we did it again!

ROCKIES RALLY 🤘 pic.twitter.com/cU9RGwKfar

— Colorado Rockies (@Rockies) July 8, 2026

Colorado improved to 38-53.

ROCKIES STARTER’S REPORT

Has Michael Lorenzen turned a corner? His recent starts would show that he has, and he continued that progress with a quality start — his first since April 24 — against the Dodgers’ nuclear-powered lineup.

This was another step forward, as he completed six innings for the first time since going seven int hat aforementioned start against the New York Mets. He allowed six hits and three walks over his work, which began with a leadoff homer allowed to Ohtani in the first inning. Lorenzen recovered and recorded nine-straight outs after Pages followed Ohtani’s homer with a single.

Lorenzen escaped the fifth inning with only one run allowed despite loading the bases. Another run came home in the sixth, as Lorenzen didn’t outduel Wrobleski, but he kept the Rockies in it. Along with the two innings of shutout work from Juan Mejia, he ensured that Colorado’s eighth-inning rally was enough to get the job done.

BITS AND PIECES

IT WAS DECIDED FOR THE ROCKIES WHEN: Romano got Freddie Freeman to chase a slider for the 27th out.

NUMBER TO NOTE: 4.02 — Lorenzen’s ERA over his last six starts; prior to that, it was 8.01.

WHAT’S NEXT: The club’s 2022 first-round pick, Gabriel Hughes, will make his first major-league start for the Rockies; Roki Sasaki gets the call for the Dodgers in the series finale. First pitch from Chavez Ravine is scheduled for 8:10 p.m. MDT.

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