Rockies’ Chase Dollander shines but offense a no-show in 4-0 loss to Astros

An essential piece of the Rockies’ future shone bright Wednesday night. That would be rookie right-hander Chase Dollander.

The present? Pretty dim.

The Astros blanked the Rockies 4-0 at Dalkin Park, the third time in the last five games the Rockies’ offense was whitewashed.

Dominated for seven innings by sinkerball lefty Framber Valdez, Colorado (38-95) managed just four hits and was shut out for the 14th time this season. Valdez allowed three hits — all singles — walked two, and struck out five. He got nine outs via groundballs.

“He’s one of the best pitchers in the game, especially left-handed,” Rockies interim manager Warren Schaeffer told reporters in Houston. “His curveball and sinker were really good. He mixed the sinker to both sides of the plate and snuck it in there when he needed to.

“He kept us on the ground. He was just really good. We had no answers for him tonight.”

Dollander had some issues, but they didn’t overshadow his impressive performance. The rookie right-hander allowed one run on three hits over six innings. He struck out seven (impressive) but walked four (problematic) in the 19th start of his rookie season.

“I thought he pitched really well and threw all of his pitches for strikes tonight,” Schaeffer said. “He was efficient, and he got through the sixth. A really good stepping stone for him, moving forward.”

The Astros took advantage of Dollander’s scattered first inning. Dollander issued a one-out walk to Yordan Alverez, who cruised into second on a wild pitch. Dollander struck out the dangerous Carlos Correa but yielded a two-out RBI single to Jesus Sanchez.

Dollander entered the game searching for efficiency. His 18.54 pitches per inning was the highest among all major league starters (minimum 18 games started). When the right-hander threw 26 pitches in the first inning, it looked like it would be another one of those games.

But Dollander settled in and finished throwing 98 pitches (61 strikes).  He induced double-play grounders in the fourth and fifth innings and averaged just 14.4 pitches over his final five innings.