The Colorado Rockies have battled valiantly against the Houston Astros in the series and Thursday’s finale was no different in that aspect. The only real difference was that the results paid off as the Rockies snagged a 7-6 win for their 20th victory of the season.

Home of the Freeland

After a rough go in his last outing, Freeland settled back in at the confines of Coors Field. Things got off to a rough start in the first when the Astros strung together three straight hits to take a 1-0 lead with one out. Another run came in on a ground out RBI for Christian Walker, making it 2-0, before Freeland escaped the inning.

He settled in nicely after that as his command improved and he began sequencing better against an aggressive Astros offense. After allowing three hits in the first inning, Freeland ended up going six innings, allowing six hits in total, with two walks and two strikeouts. The only other run that the Astros got against Freeland was on an Isaac Paredes double in the second to score Cooper Hummel, who had walked. It was a welcome return to form as Kyle notched another quality start.

Thairo’s big day

Trailing by two in the bottom of the first, the Rockies struck back thanks to an unlikely power source batting cleanup. Second baseman Thairo Estrada clubbed a two-run home run off of Brandon Walter, with the aid of the hot summer day, to tie things back up. It was his 50th career homer.

Estrada would again tie things up with a ground out in the third inning to score Jordan Beck and make it a 3-3 ballgame. He’d play hero once again as part of a seventh-inning rally, delivering an RBI single to give the Rockies a 7-5 lead, capping the inning and proving to be the difference maker.

He ended the day going 3-for-4 with four RBI while also showing off some range at second base with his glove. He is now batting .317 on the year and has three hits in four of his last six games.

Rally boys

The offense for the Rockies has been notably better of the last month. Once again it came into play in another game of this series against the Astros. The Rockies had fallen early and seen the game just out of reach as the offense put together rallies. It finally paid off on Thursday.

Following Estrada’s early heroics, the Rockies got a clutch hit from rookie Ryan Ritter in the bottom of the fourth when he delivered a two-run single to put the Rockies ahead 5-3.

The Astros would tie it back up on a Cam Smith bloop triple to score two runs in the seventh inning. However, the Rockies kept battling back in the bottom half of the inning. Tyler Freeman reached on a single and seemingly scored on a pinch-hit triple from Mickey Moniak. However, a replay challenged overturned the initial safe call, keeping the game tied. Beck gave the Rockies the lead on a single, stole second base, and scored on Estrada’s hit.

The Rockies ended up with 13 hits on the day while striking out just three times. Five hitters had multi-hit games as they went 4-for-8 with runners in scoring position.

Ninth inning tightrope

Victor Vodnik got in a little bit of trouble in the eighth but the Rockies turned to Seth Halvorsen to attempt the four-out save. He escaped the inning with no trouble but faced his own challenges in the ninth.

Jake Meyers led off the inning with a triple that was in part misplayed in the corner by Freeman. He would score on a Jose Altuve ground out, and Halvorsen subsequently struck out Smith. Back-to-back singles from Christian Walker and Victor Caratini set the stage for some trouble, but Hummel popped a ball to right field that Freeman tracked down to end the game and secure the win.

For Halvorsen, he now has seven saves on the year.

Up next

The Rockies will welcome the Chicago White Sox for the weekend series for what many are calling a must-see match-up between two of the best teams in baseball. Antonio Senzatela is penciled in as the Rockies starter and Adrian Houser takes the mound for the White Sox.

First pitch is at 6:10 p.m. MDT. See you then!

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