A long, dismal campaign is winding down for the San Francisco Giants who are no doubt anxious to put what could still be a 100-loss season behind them. A year after they were a Wild Card team, the series will feature one Wild Card contender: the Colorado Rockies. These NL West rivals have seen their fortunes reversed this season with the Rockies finally getting back to October barring a bad final couple of weeks and the Giants more than ready to ride into the sunset and turn their attention to 2018 and beyond.
This series will be contested from Tuesday, September 19, 2017 through Wednesday, September 20, 2017 at AT&T Park in San Francisco. Wednesday’s game will be shown live on MLB Network to those outside of the local television markets.
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Pitching Matchups
German Marquez will start the series for the Rockies. The young right-hander has been one of the team’s better arms.
At 22-years old, Marquez is in his rookie year and is 10-7 with a 4.41 ERA and 1.372 WHIP. In Colorado, that’s good enough for a 114 ERA+.
Surprisingly, Marquez’s home/road splits aren’t too pronounced, he is a bit better on the road, but the margins are minimal. He’s also striking out less away from Coors Field and has posted a higher WHIP on the road.
The righty has done well not letting the Coors effect get to him. While his overall year has been a success, he’s yet to throw a quality start in September and has allowed 12 runs in 13.2 innings in the month, allowing four runs in each of his three starts. His last outing was his worst, allowing four runs on 11 hits in just 3.2 innings.
Marquez isn’t trending in the right direction and he hasn’t done well against the Giants in two starts either, allowing 11 earned runs in 8.1 innings.
Marquez will be matched up against another pitcher that went just 3.2 innings in his last start: Johnny Cueto.
Last year’s NL All-Star game starter, Cueto has had a bad year. He’s made only three starts since coming off the DL at the beginning of the month, pitching to a 4.50 ERA in that span. Overall, Cueto’s battled his command in and out of the zone. He’s 7-8 with a 4.58 ERA and 1.411 WHIP. He’s allowed 21 homers in his 129.2 innings and has walked 47.
The career National League has made 15 starts against the Rockies and has enjoyed a great deal of success. Colorado is never a fun team to face for pitchers, but he’s 9-3 with a 2.66 ERA and 1.194 WHIP in 98 innings.
Based on circumstances and home ballpark, Marquez has had the better season than Cueto and may be the better matchup in Game 1. The Rockies may retain that edge in Game 2.
Colorado will send their veteran, Tyler Chatwood, to the mound on Wednesday. Chatwood is 8-12 with a 4.57 ERA. His FIP is even higher at 5.00 and he’s allowed more than his share of base runners, walking 4.8 per nine innings.
The overall numbers are a big shaky for the right-hander, but he’s been lights out in three starts since coming off the DL. In those three starts, he’s allowed only one runs in 13.2 innings. As always, he’s not one to go deep in games and he throws a ton of pitches, but he’s been great lately—at least while he’s been on the mound.
Chatwood did also throw a two-hit shutout against the Giants at AT&T Park back in April. He’s got that in him again, but is more likely to go five innings giving up a couple runs. That still should be enough to get the win.
Pitching for the Giants, opposite of Chatwood, is Matt Moore. Moore has been terrible for the Giants. He’s 5-14 with a 5.39 ERA which has gone down a bit of late. He’s sporting a 1.503 WHIP in what is a pitcher friendly park.
Moore has been a better pitcher at home than on the road, but the Rockies have torn him up regardless of venue. In three starts, he’s 0-2 allowing 19 runs and 30 hits in 12.2 innings.
Who's Hot?
The month of September has been very kind to Carlos Gonzalez. The right-fielder has been a huge disappointment all season, but is finally swinging the bat up to expectations. In 15 games this month, CarGo is 19-for-49 with five homers and seven doubles. That’s a .388 average and .837 slugging.
Gonzalez has been the Rockies’ best hitter this month, but Nolan Arenado and Charlie Blackmon are hitting as they have all year. The two have seven combined homers with Arenado slashing .345/.471.619. Blackmon has a .853 OPS this month.
Others swinging well for Colorado include Trevor Story who has kept the strikeouts somewhat in check and is putting the ball in play a bit more.
On the mound, Greg Holland seems to have refound himself this month. He’s four-for-four in save chances and has allowed one earned run and just two hits in seven innings. Pat Neshek is throwing well, too.
On the other side, the Giants don’t have too much going right. Joe Panik is batting 24-for-55 in September. Jarrett Parker is swinging well and so is Denard Span. Buster Posey is batting over .300 for the month, but the power has gone away.
Who's Not?
While Holland and Neshek are pitching well right now, the rest of the bullpen is still not up to par. Adam Ottovino and Jake McGee specifically have struggled. Both are important parts to this pen. The duo of relievers has combined for nine innings in September, allowing 10 runs.
At the plate, there’s not much to get worked up over for Colorado. The Rockies do, however, have Mark Reynolds and Ian Desmond hitting .170 and .196 respectively. Jonathan Lucroy is still showing next-to-no power despite reasonable on-base skills.
On the Giants side of things, Pablo Sandoval doesn’t look any better in San Francisco than he did in Boston. He’s batting .108 with a .417 OPS in September.
The Giants’ bullpen is also a mess. Mark Melancon didn’t stabilize the biggest weakness from last year. Things have gotten worse.
After some early success, Sam Dyson has faltered again. Right now, nobody is reliable in relief.
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