While not competing for any standings in the postseason, the Colorado Rockies still gave their fans plenty to cheer about in their most recent home stand. With the calendar freshly flipped to the month of August, the Rockies opened a six-game set against the Pittsburgh Pirates and the Toronto Blue Jays. Playing their best baseball of the season since the All-Star break, the fledgling boys of summer started the set with a masterful come-from-behind victory complete with a championship-type celebration at the end. For the encore, they would record yet another comeback win, going against baseball’s premier pitcher, Paul Skenes.

Friday’s 17-16 win over the Pirates was arguably the biggest comeback in the team’s history. Before they would even get their first at-bat, they were down 9-0 in the first inning. By the eighth inning, they were still trailing 16-10, when Rockies’ pitcher Dugan Darnell would make his debut in the big leagues. Holding the Pirates at bay, the Rockies would make their improbable comeback capped by a walk-off two-run home run by Brenton Doyle for the game winner.

Four teams had accomplished the same feat dating back to 1884. Cleveland is in the record books for two of those with the Cleveland Blues on June 21, 1884, and the Cleveland Indians’ 15-13 win over the Royals on Aug. 23, 2006. The other teams to accomplish the feat include the Philadelphia Phillies on June 8, 1989, and the Reds on Sept. 30, 1913, and on May 17, 1896.

“That’s got to be the most incredible game I’ve ever been involved in, hands down, with all the stuff that went into that, down 9-0 in the first inning without us even picking up a bat,” interim manager Warren Schaeffer said. “Then, crawling our way back into the game, grabbing momentum in the middle part of the game, and losing it inning after inning because of walks.

And then Dugan Darnell coming in, and his story, in the eighth inning, throwing up a zero, in the ninth inning throwing up a zero, and getting a win and coming back and winning like that. It was a really fabulous game.”

There was plenty of heroics to go around in the Friday night extravaganza. For Doyle, it was the first walk-off home run of his career. Then there was Ezequiel Tovar celebrating his 24th birthday with four doubles, becoming the first player to record the feat on his birthday. And there were multi-it games from five players: Doyle (4-for-5), Hunter Goodman (2-for-5), Warming Bernabel (4-for-6), Thairo Estrada (2-for-6), and Mickey Moniak (2-for-5).

“Getting down nine in the first is tough to come back from,” Doyle said. “But we kept the energy high. We kept fighting, and, oh my God, what a game!” Over his last seven games, Doyle is slashing .500/.519/.654 (13-for-26) with a double, a homer, and three RBIs.“It’s just having the right guys in the clubhouse,’ Doyle went on to say. “You have a lot of guys that got a lot of fight in them, and it showed tonight.”

With a rewarding win under their belt, the Rockies would return to work the next day to face one of the preeminent pitchers in the game today, Paul Skenes, the 6-foot-6 phenom in his second year in the majors. Skenes, the 2024 NL Rookie of the Year, finished the 2024 season with a league-best ERA of 1.96 (for pitchers who had at least 130 innings pitched), the lowest ERA of any rookie pitcher with a minimum of 20 starts since the start of the live-ball era in 1920.

With Skenes and his 1.83 ERA on the mound, he would pitch his way to the sixth inning with eight strikeouts and a 4-0 lead.  Then, for the second time in the home stand, the Rockies’ bats would come alive. After a Jordan Beck three-run home run, the Rockies didn’t look back. It would be the first three-run home run given up by Skenes in his 46-game career. And, it was the fifth time in Rockies’ history and first since 2016 that the Rockies would win consecutive games after trailing by four or more runs.

First baseman Warming Bernabel, in his first week in the majors, followed Beck with a double for Skenes’ final pitch of the game. The hit gave Bernabel eight extra-base hits in his first seven Rockies’ career games for a club record. Trevor Story was the last Rockie to do it with seven extra-base hits in his first seven games in 2016. For his efforts, Bernable was named the NL Player of the Week. In a twist of irony, Trevor Story, now with the Boston Red Sox, was named the AL Player of the Week.

“For me, to be mentioned alongside Story and break his records, that means a lot to me,” Bernabel said through an interpreter. “So obviously, it’s special to do that thing, and so I’m very proud of what I’ve done. And to be able to be mentioned with him, that makes me very proud.”

Interim manager Schaeffer spoke on Bernabel receiving the award. “It’s his first eight, nine games in the big leagues,” Schaeffer said, “and then he wins NL Player of the Week. I mean, that’s special. That’s all. That’s what every kid dreams of, to come out there and make a contribution and get accolades in the first week in the big leagues. He’s done everything to deserve it. I’m just happy for him.”

The 8-5 come-from-behind victory over the Pirates on Saturday clinched the series win for the Rockies over the Pirates, who would go on to lose the Sunday matchup, 9-5. They would still improve to 8-7 since the All-Star break.

Even though they would lose the Sunday finale and miss getting their first home series sweep, the Rockies still found a way to produce some excitement for the fans. Mickey Moniak, Hunter Goodman, and Jordan Beck gave Colorado its first back-to-back-to-back home runs of the season. It was the first time since Nolan Arenado, Trevor Story, and Ian Desmond accomplished the feat on June 19, 2018. After two great comebacks in their first two games against the Pirates, the Rockies thought they could do it again.

“We never really thought we were out of the game at any point,” Beck said. “We were putting together some decent ABs, but just weren’t really stringing them together. I felt throughout the game that something was going to happen.“Then, obviously, it was a good moment for us. But we fell short today.”

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