Tigers sweep Rockies for historically bad start
The Detroit Tigers have been able to do something the Colorado Rockies haven’t in years. The organization recognized their team’s incapability of competing for the playoffs and made changes to attempt building a winning team.
After nearly a decade of missing out on the postseason, Detroit turned the club around and beat the $174 million Houston Astros in the AL Wild Card series last year. Now, they’re 25-13 and atop their division with realistic hopes of making the World Series.
Meanwhile, the Rockies lost their fourth, fifth and sixth games in a row to Detroit, bringing their record to 6-31. A feat that ties the 1988 Baltimore Orioles for the worst start through 37 games in Major League Baseball’s 148-year history.
Heavy rain on Tuesday, May 6, postponed game one of the series and set a doubleheader for Thursday.
Colorado’s rookie Chase Dollander got the start on Wednesday against resembling Tigers newcomer Jackson Jobe. The 21-year-old who made two appearances on the mound last year in relief, but 2025 marks his first season as a starting arm.
Both didn’t bring their best stuff, as the Rockies got eight hits and six runs off Jobe which were both career-highs. Dollander threw a career-low three innings and had his first outing without a strikeout.
Catcher Hunter Goodman extended his hitting streak to eight games and on-base to 11, as he has hit a .333 average with a .378 on-base percentage and .452 slugging percentage during the stretch.
Jordan Beck’s RBI in the bottom of the fourth tied the game 6-6, which carried into extra innings. After relief pitcher Zach Agnos allowed an RBI double from Tigers’ Spencer Torkleson, Beck dropped a fly ball into shallow left field that allowed their second run in the tenth. Colorado went down in order in the bottom half of the inning and lost 8-6.
The doubleheader on Thursday, May 8 was one of the worst collective performances by the Rockies across two games, even in 2025. Colorado got outscored by 18 runs which ties the franchise record for largest negative run differential across a doubleheader.
Kyle Freeland got the start in game one of two and yielded a season-high 11 hits and nine runs over just three innings. Angel Chivilli did a great job out of his bullpen endeavor, throwing 3.2 innings and giving up one run. It was a career high in frames for Chivilli and the longest a Rockies reliever had gone in 274 days.
However, the negative outweighs the positive as Colorado only tallied four hits in the 10-2 loss.
Rockies’ Tanner Gordon got the emergency call-up in wake of the doubleheader, getting the start in the series finale. Gordon started eight games for the injured rotation last year, but got moved back down to Triple-A at the start of 2025.
Gordon pitched into the seventh inning giving up four earned runs. That matched his career-high in innings, but dropped to an 0-7 record with an 8.17 earned run average (ERA) in just nine career starts. The second game might’ve been worse than the first as the Rox lost game three 11-1.
The Rockies had four errors in the three games of this series, and simply showed no fight.
“Keep believing in us,” a depleted Kyle Freeland said after the rough day. “Keep riding.”
Unlike the Tigers, who have given their fans a reason to show up to games, the expectations of this Rockies season have somehow gone below rock-bottom. The goal of not losing 100 games absurdly needs to now be set to 130, as Colorado is on-pace for a 26-136 record. That would handsomely break the MLB’s current all-time losing record by 15 games.
“You just gotta keep going, we gotta keep battling through it,” Manager Bud Black said after the sweep. “This is a situation where you can’t crawl under a rock, you gotta come out and keep going. Gotta have your chest out and chin up and keep going.”
The 6-31 Rockies will host the 23-13 San Diego Padres, with first pitch at Coors Field Friday at 6:40 p.m.