MEDIA CLIPS – September 14, 2017 Rox, D-backs wrap up Wild Card showdown By Jarrid Denney / MLB.com | September 14th, 2017 PHOENIX -- The Rockies will pit Chad Bettis against the D-backs' Zack Godley on Thursday afternoon in Phoenix in the finale of a four-game series featuring the National League Wild Card leaders. Arizona snapped Colorado's six-game winning streak on Wednesday and has a four-game lead on the top spot. Bettis' start on Saturday against the Dodgers brought him his first win of the season and his first since his Aug. 14 return from his battle with testicular cancer. Bettis (1-2, 4.98 ERA) will try to make it two wins in a row when the Rockies take on the D-backs at Chase Field on Thursday. The 28-year-old right-hander held the Dodgers to three earned runs on six hits in his victory. It was the second time in a row that he had held an opponent to three runs. In nine career appearances against the D-backs, Bettis is 1-1 with a 7.30 ERA in 37 innings. Godley (7-7, 3.18 ERA) held the Padres to two runs on four hits over seven innings in a no-decision on Saturday in his last start. Godley has just three wins in eight starts since the start of August, but he has held opponents to four runs or fewer in each of those starts. Things to know about this game • Godley piled up nine strikeouts against the Padres on Saturday, and each of those came via his nasty curveball. Only two pitchers this season have struck out more batters in a single game with curves. Godley ranks third in the Majors with 94 curveball strikeouts this year. 1 • In two career starts against the Rockies, Godley is 2-0 with a 2.77 ERA (4 ER in 13 innings) and 15 strikeouts. • Bettis has held D-backs All-Star third baseman Jake Lamb to a .071 average (1-for-14) with seven strikeouts in his career. 2 Rockies’ win streak halts at six By Jarrid Denney and Thomas Harding / MLB.com | September 14th, 2017 PHOENIX -- Patrick Corbin turned in a stellar performance and A.J. Pollock went 3-for-4 with a homer and four RBIs to lead a 16-hit attack as the D-backs snapped the Rockies' six-game winning streak and padded their National League Wild Card lead with an 8-2 victory on Wednesday night at Chase Field. With the win, the D-backs pushed their lead for first place in the NL Wild Card race to four games. They also clinched a season-series win over the Rockies, which could pay dividends in the coming weeks. If the two teams end up tied in the standings at season's end, the first tiebreaker is decided by head-to-head record. Colorado still leads for the second NL Wild Card spot, by three games over Milwaukee and 3 1/2 games over St. Louis. After getting roughed up in his previous start, Corbin held the Rockies to four hits and one run over 6 2/3 innings while striking out seven. "It was kind of reminiscent of his [Aug. 1] Cubs outing in Chicago," D-backs manager Torey Lovullo said. "He comes back his next outing and then has four or five real good outings that were strung together. It was a little bit of the same; it was fastball command. The pressure that he was putting on the hitters by executing a great game plan and setting up the fastball. The Colorado Rockies are a very good offensive team -- we know that. When you go 6 2/3, 105 pitches and allow one run, you're doing something very, very special." German Marquez has been a solid presence in the Rockies' rotation most of the season, but the right-hander lasted just four innings in his previous outing and was lifted after 3 2/3 innings on Wednesday. The D-backs taxed Marquez for 11 hits, scoring single runs in each of his four innings. "With the lack of a breaking ball, it became a fastball-dominated repertoire for him," Rockies manager Bud Black said. "They squared some balls up." MOMENTS THAT MATTERED Mr. 1,000: The D-backs scored single runs in each of the first five innings. In the third, Paul Goldschmidt smashed a double off the center-field wall and scored on an ensuing J.D. Martinez double to left. With the double, Goldschmidt joined Luis Gonzalez (1,337) as the only players in franchise history to record 1,000 hits in a D-backs uniform. Since Goldschmidt made his big league debut on Aug. 1, 2011, he has the 14th most hits in the Majors. 3 "I went to congratulate him, and he just kind of pushed me aside," Lovullo said. "I said, 'Hey, you know this is a pretty incredible accomplishment. I know one day you're gonna appreciate this. I know right now you want to win this game, and we will, but when you think about what you've done, a thousand hits at the Major League level is an incredible accomplishment.' For those of us who have been around him all year long, he takes it right in stride, but I think it will hit him at some point that he's reached an incredible milestone." Corbin keeps calm: The Rockies had their best chance at a comeback in the sixth inning, when DJ LeMahieu hit a one- out homer to left-center to make it a 5-1 game. Corbin then intentionally walked Nolan Arenado, and Trevor Story roped a single to center. With the tying run on deck, Corbin buckled down and escaped the jam by striking out Mark Reynolds looking at a fastball and getting Carlos Gonzalez on a groundout to first. "He located the fastball when he needed to, but it was more about the slider," Black said. "We struggled against him. We needed one hit or two to get back in the game." SOUND SMART WITH YOUR FRIENDS Jake Lamb went 2-for-5 with two RBIs, giving him 101 on the season. This is the first time Lamb has reached the century mark, and he joins Goldschmidt (112) to give the D-backs two players with 100-plus RBIs for the second time in franchise history, joining the 1999 club that had four: Jay Bell (112), Steve Finley (103), Gonzalez (111) and Matt Williams (142). WHAT'S NEXT Rockies: Right-hander Chad Bettis (1-2, 4.98 EA), making his seventh start since returning from a bout with testicular cancer and coming off his first win, will face the D-backs on Thursday at 1:40 p.m. MT as the Rockies attempt to win the four-game series at Chase Field. D-backs: The D-backs will close out their four-game set with the Rockies at 12:40 p.m. MST Thursday at Chase Field. Zack Godley (7-7, 3.18 ERA) will get the start as he aims to pick up his third win against Colorado this season. 4 Marquez forced to rely on fastball By Thomas Harding / MLB.com | September 14th, 2017 PHOENIX -- The problem for Rockies rookie right-hander German Marquez was that his fastball -- which was all he had - - was not good Wednesday night. The result was his second straight short outing. Marquez yielded 11 hits, including five doubles, in 3 2/3 innings of an 8-2 loss to the D-backs at Chase Field. "My breaking ball was not really sharp," said Marquez (10-7). "My breaking ball was not really sharp, and I became a one- pitch pitcher, pretty much." Marquez's rough night ended the Rockies' win streak at six games. The Rockies are in the lead for the second National League Wild Card spot and trail the D-backs, who hold the top spot, by four games. Even more, Wednesday's result meant the D-backs clinch the season series, which means the Rockies will have to overtake them in the standings outright to host the Wild Card Game, as head-to-head record is the first tiebreaker. The Rockies are three games ahead of the Brewers and 3 1/2 ahead of the Cardinals -- their closest NL Wild Card competitors. According to Statcast™, Marquez threw fastballs on 77 percent of his 70 pitches on Wednesday -- his highest rate this season. All but one of the hits came on a fastball. Of those fastballs for hits, just two were on the border of the strike zone; the rest caught too much of the plate to be effective. J.D. Martinez doubled off a third-inning curve, which hung in the strike zone and helped convince Marquez that he had to throw fastballs and hope. "You can get away with throwing all fastballs if you locate and you move it around the zone, but from my vantage point, there were some balls thigh high and a little bit higher, and it looked like they were out over the plate," Rockies manager Bud Black said. Is this a pattern for Marquez, who is 22 but for much of the year has pitched as if he's been around longer? This is his second straight abbreviated start. He went just four innings Friday and yielded four runs (two earned) and six hits in the Rockies' eventual 5-4 victory. While there was something to be said for giving up just four runs despite the heavy hit total Wednesday, the concern is that a pattern is developing.