Round One: Rockies

Final: Rockies 5, Dodgers 4, 10 innings. Winning pitcher: Matt Herges? Yikes!

The Blue missed a number of opportunities in this game. The offense was 2 for 10 with RISP tonight. The pitching did what it was supposed to, more or less, but I wasn't too keen on Joe Torre's choice of relievers in the 9th and 10th innings when he still had George Sherrill and Jonathan Broxton waiting for a call in the bullpen.

Several hitters had nice games overall for the Dodgers. Manny was on-base three times, including coming up with a game-tying RBI-knock in the 9th off a Huston Street-less Rockies pen. Andre Ethier had three hits and was on-base four times, and Casey Blake was on-base three times including a solo homerun that gave them an early 2-0 lead.

James Loney, however, continues to struggle, even in a place where he usually dominates. Loney went 0 for 5, and botched an important play late in the game after James McDonald overran a litlle grounder between the mound and first base. Before last night though, Loney was a career .372 hitter at Coors in 103 plate appearances with 34 RBI. Something just isn't right with him, and if he'd stop dancing around in the batter's box, he might straighten out his problems there.

Clayton Kershaw, meanwhile, pitch 6 1/3 solid innings, giving up just a Brad Hawpe two-run homerun that tied the game at 2-2. (Hawpe, by the way, just owns the Dodgers in his career, hitting .359, with 19 homeruns and 74 RBI in 328 plate appearances after last night). Kershaw wasn't as overpowering as we've seen, but he was effective.

The Dodgers N.L. West lead is dwindled down to two now. They still have the best record in the N.L. at 74-52, but they're now just .002 percentage points away from giving that up, too.

So, now on to round two tonight. The principles: Randy Wolf for the Dodgers, Josh Fogg for the Rockies. Maybe Torre will move Wolf up in the batting order to give the Dodgers a "bat" in the middle of the lineup that might come through with runners on base.