DENVER – The life of the closer is going to include some difficult nights when the weight of a tough loss falls squarely on your shoulders. But giving the opponent a free pass to a win makes it particularly difficult to swallow.
With the bases loaded and two out in the 10th inning, Braves closer Arodys Vizcaino walked Tony Wolters on four pitches to give the Rockies a 3-2 win at Coors Field, a win via the proverbial walk-off walk.
“Difficult situation, you make any mistake and the game’s over,” Vizicano said through a translator. “Just one of those things, pitches weren’t falling in the zone right now. Things happen.”
To make matters worse, he put himself in the bases-loaded situation by walking the previous batter. Story’s bases-loaded walk came after Vizcaino had intentionally walked Gerardo Parra with first base open and then walked Trevor Story after getting ahead in the count 1-2 and throwing Story three straight sliders for balls, two in the dirt including one for a wild pitch to advance both runners.
“It looked like he got out of whack and was having a hard time regrouping himself,” Braves manager Brian Snitker said. “I thought maybe with the breaking balls when he walked the hitter before (Story) that maybe he was just trying to get him to chase, just get himself out. But he just kind of got out of whack there and it’s a tough spot in the game to try and work your way back.
“He just wasn’t firing good. ‘Cause he started out throwing the ball really well, I thought. It just kind of got away from him.”
In the top of the 10th inning, the Braves had a runner at third and two out when Story leapt to make a great play and stab Nick Markakis’ line drive before it could sail over the shortstop’s head for a hit and would-be go-ahead RBI.
Then in the bottom of the inning, Carlos Gonzalez got the Rockies started with a one-out double off Vizcaino, who struck out the next batter, Ian Desmond. And soon after, his trouble began.
Snitker had Vizicaino intententionally walk left-handed hitter Parra with first base open to bring up the right-handed Story, whose fourth-inning homer had given the Rockies a 2-0 lead.
“I just liked the matchup better there. Parra’s a tough little hitter, man,” Snitker said. “Just with the right-on-right breaking ball and his velocity is really good, I like that matchup a lot better than the one before.”
Vizcaino was a strike away from getting out of the inning and Story had fouled off a 98-mph fastball far out of play into the right-field seats. But then he threw him three sliders that Story took for balls, and it changed everything.
“The pitches were feeling good so that’s what I was going with,” Vizcaino said of the decision to throw sliders. “They just weren’t falling in the zone. But that’s just part of the game, it doesn’t always work out that way. There’s got to be a winner and loser.”
Snitker was asked about Vizcaino’s pitch selection and if he wished the pitcher had gone with something else in that sequence.
“I wasn’t even thinking in that mode,” Snitker said. “I was just, whatever he felt like. Honestly I don’t watch a game like that, I don’t watch and second-guess pitches or anything like that. He’s going to go after them. He knows what he’s doing. I thought his stuff was really good when he came out of the pen and it just kind of got away from him a little bit.”
After the Story walk loaded the bases, a crowd of 40,120 was roaring as Wolters strode to the plate. Four pitches later, including one slider followed by three fastballs, all out of the strike zone, the game, and the Braves’ three-game winning streak, were over.
Remarkably, it was the third consecutive walk-off win for the Rockies that has been decided by a walk, a streak dating to Aug. 3, 2017.
