Moniak extending homer streak not enough to complete comeback ... again

DENVER -- Home runs never get old for the Rockies’ Mickey Moniak. On Thursday, he made it four games in a row with one. But each time the game finished with the same old result.

“It doesn’t mean much if you lose,” Moniak said after his ninth-inning, two-run shot brought the deficit to the two runs that the Rockies never got in their 9-7 loss to the Marlins at Coors Field. “Today, the last couple of games here, and [Sunday] in San Diego, we’re playing tight games and just coming up short.

“It’s heartbreaking, for sure.”

For the win-starved Rockies, at 41-112, the habit of comebacks that fall just short has been going on much longer than the power run of Moniak, who became the first Rockies player to go deep in four straight games since Ryan McMahon May 26-29, 2023.

The Rockies’ last win tied them with last year’s White Sox, whose 41 for the entire season was the lowest total in baseball’s modern era. Manager Warren Schaeffer noted recently that merely eclipsing the record is not a worthy goal, but with 18 losses in their last 21 games, the Rockies are making win No. 42 a difficult proposition.

Many of the losses come in gut-wrenching fashion.

“We come back every night -- it just isn’t enough,” Schaeffer said. “You want to win games. That’s the goal.

“The goal isn’t to come back every night and end the night with the loss. It’s good that they keep fighting. Don’t get me wrong. It’s fantastic. But everybody in there [the clubhouse] will tell you the same thing. It’s not enough.”

Thursday was a study in doing just enough to barely lose.

On Thursday, recent call-up Blaine Crim homered in the second inning and Yanquiel Fernández went deep in the seventh against otherwise strong Marlins starter Sandy Alcantara. Rox starter Tanner Gordon yielded consecutive homers in the third, to Liam Hicks and Otto Lopez, to spoil an otherwise solid start (6 IP, 4 R, 3 ER).

The game seemed like another loss when Heriberto Hernandez knocked a two-run homer off Rockies reliever Ryan Rolison in the top of the ninth. But as has been the case in too many winnable games, that was just enough.

The Rockies entered the ninth trailing, 9-3, before Crim homered again and Ryan Ritter added a two-out RBI double, both hits off Valente Bellozo. Moniak chased Bellozo by blasting his 24th homer of the year, making the score 9-7. But Calvin Faucher yielded a Hunter Goodman single before coaxing a grounder to the mound from Jordan Beck, who had struck out four times previously.

While acknowledging that homers in wins are more meaningful, Moniak could appreciate his power surge in and of itself.

“Last year, I had three homers in four games, something like that,” said Moniak, who will face his employer last year, the Angels, in a three-game series starting Friday that ends the Rockies’ home schedule. “But when I get in the box, I’m not thinking about it. I’m trying to put together a good at-bat and I’m trusting what I’ve got.”