In the three seasons prior to this one, Jhoulys Chacin walked at least four batters per nine innings. He led the NL with 87 walks in 194 innings in 2011. In an injury-shortened season in 2012, Chacin walked 37 batters in 69 innings. This season, Chacin has walked 37 batters in 135 innings.
Friday night against the Pirates, he threw 70 of his 96 pitches for strikes during eight dominant innings and did not walk a batter.
"His command was electric," Clint Hurdle said. "He threw everything for strikes. Everything."
Chacin kept the Pirates' offense from compensating for the mistakes from the pitching staff. Gerrit Cole made a mistake to Troy Tulowitzki, who hit a 3-2 slider for a home run. Four wild pitches, all of them allowing runners to advance to scoring position, combined with some RBI singles that made the difference.
"I just felt like we played a good game," Cole said. "We just didn't string hits together at the right times early."
In today's Post-Gazette: Decisive sixth inning, Chacin send Pirates to loss.
Pirates notebook: Hughes recalled, Taillon to be promoted.
Coverage of the Rockies with the Denver Post.
First Published: March 24, 2016, 5:13 p.m.