Pirates nearly no-hit, shut out for 2nd consecutive day at Coors Field - TribLIVE

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Teams typically find their offense when they visit Coors Field. Not the Pittsburgh Pirates, at least not this week.

The Pirates were shut out for a second consecutive day in Denver, nearly getting no-hit by German Marquez in a 8-0 loss to the Colorado Rockies on Tuesday night.

Marquez’s bid to pitch the Rockies’ first no-hitter at home in the 29-season history of the franchise was broken up by a Ka’ai Tom line-drive single that led off the ninth.

“He tried to groove a fastball right there; I was able to put a good swing on it,” said Tom, who’d had just two hits in his previous 41 at-bats. “I was just fortunate that I hit it high enough to the second baseman that he didn’t catch it.”

Pirates pinch-hitter Ka'ai Tom breaks up German Marquez's no-hitter in the 9th inning and the Rockies crowd erupts with a huge ovation

Marquez promptly got the next hitter to ground into a double play then finished with a one hitter pic.twitter.com/DRRAfgwrDQ

— Talkin’ Baseball (@TalkinBaseball_) June 30, 2021

No other batted balls by the Pirates on Tuesday were fortunate enough not to be fielded cleanly. Few were the day before, either. The past two days mark just the third time in the quarter-century-plus history of the ballpark that a team was shut out in consecutive games at Coors Field.

Over 18 innings in the thin Rocky Mountain air that long has produced plenty of home runs and scoring, the Pirates have managed seven hits — none for extra bases — and 10 baserunners. The only Pirates to reach base against Marquez besides Tom were Jacob Stallings getting hit by a pitch in the second, Phillip Evans walking in the fifth.

Two — including Tom — were erased by double plays hit into by the following batter.

“We didn’t have a lot of solid contact,” Pirates manager Derek Shelton said. “The very first ball of the game, (Adam) Frazier hit it hard down the line and (Joshua) Fuentes made a nice play on it. Other than that, we didn’t hit a lot of things on the barrel.”

According to Statcast, Colorado had the five hardest-hit balls of the game, measured by exit velocity.

“(Marquez) did a really nice job keeping us off the barrel,” Shelton said. “… He commanded the breaking ball extremely well and then mixed in the fastball, especially late, and that’s what gave us problems. His tempo was really good all night.”

Marquez faced only one batter over the minimum against a Pirates lineup that was without usual No. 3 and 4 hitters Bryan Reynolds (rest) and Colin Moran (hand injury).

Relying on a mix of a four-seam fastball that averaged almost 95 mph and a swing-and-miss-inducing slider with an occasional curveball, Marquez (7-6) needed only 92 pitches to get through nine innings in 2 hours, 18 minutes Tuesday. He had five strikeouts.

“(Marquez) was able to locate his pitches very well,” Tom said. “He had his four-seam working, his slider. He was just mixing it up and keeping us off-balance. I also feel like he got lucky.”

Pitchers traditionally have needed a lot more than luck to come that close to a no-hitter in Colorado. How rare are no-hitters there? Ubaldo Jimenez has the only Rockies’ no-no – but it was in Atlanta (in 2010). Of the more than 2,200 major-league games played in Denver, the only no-hitter was thrown by the Los Angeles Dodgers’ Hideo Nomo on Sept. 17, 1996.

According to MLB.com, a Rockies pitcher hadn’t made it even six innings with a no-hitter intact at Coors Field since July 9, 2017.

Other than Fuentes in the first inning, Colorado shortstop Trevor Story made arguably the two best defensive plays in support of Marquez. The latter one was the more spectacular — he extended fully in leaping to catch a line drive off the bat of Jacob Stallings to lead off the eighth. Story also robbed Ke’Bryan Hayes of an infield hit in the seventh when he stayed with an odd hop to make a play to throw Hayes out.

Marquez was bidding for the eighth official no-hitter of this not-yet-halfway-completed MLB season. He’d gotten through five innings without allowing a hit in his prior start — at Seattle on June 23.

Marquez also had two doubles, two runs and an RBI as a hitter.

Former Pirates catcher Elias Diaz accounted for another Rockies run when he homered for the second consecutive day.

That was one of four extra-base hits, nine hits of any type and five runs charged to Pirates starter Chase De Jong (0-3), who was making his first appearance since being recalled from Triple-A and second appearance of the season.

“You could definitely feel the tempo of the game was going,” De Jong said, “and it had a lot to do with what (Marquez) was doing on the other side. It was fun to kinda try and hold that pace.”

The Pirates came within two innings of getting no-hit earlier this season April 23 before Stallings doubled off of JA Happ of the Minnesota Twins.

The Pirates have been no-hit eight times since 1900 — three of those coming since 2012 after it hadn’t happened to them for the previous 41 years. Lucas Giolito of the White Sox allowed no hits against the Pirates during a game last year in Chicago.

Love baseball? Stay up-to-date with the latest Pittsburgh Pirates news.

Chris Adamski is a Tribune-Review staff writer. You can contact Chris by email at cadamski@triblive.com or via Twitter .

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