Dodger Road Streak Is Cooked

DENVER —  Good times often end here for visiting teams because it’s still difficult to pitch well at Coors Field.

Odalis Perez experienced a mile-high disappointment Tuesday night as the Colorado Rockies ended the Dodgers’ road winning streak at nine games, 7-2, before 27,934.

Colorado accumulated 1,263 feet worth of home runs against Perez in 4 1/3 innings. Perez gave up Jeromy Burnitz’s 25th homer, Todd Helton’s 21st and Todd Greene’s eighth among 10 hits, and six earned runs in his worst start of the season after the Dodgers won the opener of the four-game series.

“This ballpark is completely unforgiving,” Manager Jim Tracy said. “They hit a few balls out of the ballpark in the first four innings of the game, which is really the big difference in the game.”

But Perez wasn’t the only one who struggled. Colorado starter Aaron Cook befuddled the Dodgers for the second time in as many starts.

The 25-year-old right-hander took a shutout into the eighth and worked 7 1/3 innings to help the Rockies win for the fourth time in five games.

“He’s good,” third baseman Adrian Beltre said. “He’s got good stuff and a lot of late movement.

“The last time he pitched he was good [at Dodger Stadium]. I think he was doing better today.”

The Dodgers had only five hits through the seventh. They squandered opportunities to pull closer in the eighth after Paul Lo Duca ended Cook’s shutout bid with a one-out, two-run homer.

Beltre and Milton Bradley had consecutive singles after Lo Duca’s 10th homer, sending Cook to the dugout while receiving a standing ovation.

Right-hander Scott Dohmann entered and quickly put down the rally, striking out Shawn Green and Juan Encarnacion.

With Dohmann on the mound in the ninth, Lo Duca grounded out to end the game with runners on first and second.

The Dodgers (58-41) lost for only the fourth time in their last 22 games and maintained a 3 1/2-game lead in the National League West. They have two games remaining here this series, and the formula for success is clear.

“We did hit some balls very hard, but we happened to hit them right at their outfielders,” Tracy said. “They hit a few balls out of the ballpark.”

Cook (5-4) pitched seven strong innings and left with a 2-1 lead Thursday at Dodger Stadium in a game the Dodgers rallied to win, 4-2. The fourth-place Rockies (43-57) didn’t waste Cook’s effort this time.

“I don’t think it’s so much Aaron Cook just versus the Dodgers,” Tracy said. “If you go back and look at what he’s done over his last several starts, and not all of them involved the Dodgers, this kid has pitched pretty well for them as of late.”

Perez (4-4) wasn’t up to the challenge.

The left-hander is winless since June 16. Perez declined to speak with reporters after his earned-run average increased from 2.81 to 3.15.

“This may sound stupid, but his quality pitches to bad pitches [ratio] was pretty good,” pitching coach Jim Colborn said. “But the bad pitches here ... Who knows what some of them would have done if we had been at our field?”

Perez struggled from the outset.

Helton connected on a 442-foot, two-out solo blast to center in the first. The nine-pitch at-bat was a sign of bad things to come for Perez.

“Helton put a very good at-bat on him,” Tracy said.

Burnitz extended Colorado’s lead to 3-0 with a one-out, two-run homer in the second. Greene’s 444-foot leadoff homer in the fourth put the Rockies ahead, 4-0, and Burnitz’s two-run triple in the fifth ended Perez’s work.

“Jeromy Burnitz’s ball was up and out over the plate,” Tracy said. “Todd Greene hit a hanging breaking ball out of the ballpark.

“When you elevate pitches, and they hang up in the strike zone, and they’re thrown to the wrong people that have that type of power, they’re going to hit the ball out of the ballpark.”