Ron Chenoy-USA TODAY Sports
Jake McGee is not a fan of Coors Field. Camilo Doval can now tell some horror stories, too.
The former Rockies closer, who flamed out after signing with Colorado before resurrecting his career elsewhere, watched Colorado score three in the last inning Tuesday before Doval allowed a walkoff homer in a stomach-turning, 8-6, seven-inning loss at Coors Field, about as disappointing a split of a doubleheader as possible.
The Giants could not get the final out. The final five Rockies batters reached base, Charlie Blackmon’s three-run home run turning the winning Giants into losers. A batter prior, young Doval induced a bloop from C.J. Cron, but it was perfectly placed in shallow right to keep the game going.
The Giants (18-12) still hold the National League’s best record but whiffed on a chance to gain some separation. They’re a game up on the Padres and 1.5 away from the Dodgers.
The Giants will remember the bloop and the blast but also the nine they left on base. They could not come up with a big hit until Steven Duggar’s fifth-inning single, and it turned out to not be enough.
Against a shaky Colorado bullpen in the fifth inning, the Giants loaded the bases with one out, and Duggar worked the count to a favorable 2-1. Mychal Givens threw a middle-of-the-plate 94-mph fastball that Duggar volleyed the other way, scoring Wilmer Flores and Evan Longoria.
Duggar had an RBI double in Game One of the doubleheader, and these were his first three runs batted in of the season. He had three RBIs in 21 games and 36 plate appearances last year. (And what the Giants might have liked more than his RBI single was his seventh-inning bunt hit.)
Flores provided some insurance by hooking his second homer of the year down the left-field line, a two-run shot in the sixth that gave him four RBIs on the day.
Duggar comes up clutch pic.twitter.com/HmZm1BBRwK
— SF Giants on NBCS (@NBCSGiants) May 5, 2021
As it turned out, a rainy Coors Field threw cold water on their surge. They wasted several opportunities and were twice thrown out on the bases through four innings, and a C.J. Cron two-run blast in the fourth tied the game at 2.
Both of Tuesday’s games started off the same way: with first-inning shots from Brandon Belt. In the second tilt, he lined one rather than skied one, just clearing the right-field wall to put the Giants up 2-0. Belt had struck out in eight straight games before Game One of the doubleheader and was batting .200 with 14 strikeouts in the span. On Tuesday, he went 4-for-7 with two dingers and seven RBIs.
The offense nearly made a more-human Alex Wood record a victory. He matched his season high by allowing two runs — on the Cron homer that came from a hanging slider — and was not especially sharp over five innings, in which he allowed four hits and walked two. Still, without his best stuff he limited an offense at Coors Field.
In between games, Gabe Kapler acknowledged they were just trying to get to Thursday’s off day healthy enough; Tommy La Stella, Donovan Solano and Mike Yastrzemski are on the IL; Brandon Crawford had missed consecutive games with a calf contusion before starting in the first tilt and taking over in the later innings in the second. And his second-game fill-in had a second-inning scare.
Dubon got drilled in the hand by an 86-mph Ryan Castellani changeup and continually shook that hand, in clear pain while Giants trainers looked at him and put him through grip tests. Apparently he was OK to stay in, though he was thrown out at second on a steal attempt on which he slid feet first, perhaps shielding his hand. He later shifted to center field when Crawford entered for shortstop defense.