It’s the opening game of an interleague set on the diamond in the Mile-High City as a pair of sub-.500 teams take the field. The Texas Rangers are on the road as they open up a brief two-game set with the Colorado Rockies Tuesday night. Texas closed a four-game wraparound set with the Twins on Monday night. The Rangers won Sunday’s game of that series 7-0 to ensure no worse than a split. Colorado fell 9-8 in 11 innings to the Giants at home in their previous game Sunday afternoon. The Rockies swept the first two-game series between the teams, which came on the road back on April 11-12.
Texas won their second straight and their third in the last four games as they rolled past Minnesota Sunday afternoon. The Rangers entered Monday third in the AL West, 22 games behind the Astros for the top spot in the division. They were 10.5 games behind the Mariners for the final wild card spot in the American League playoff picture. On Sunday, Texas got two hits each from Marcus Semien (run, three RBI), Brad Miller (run, RBI) and Nathaniel Lowe (run, RBI) in the victory. Semien (his 19th) and Lowe (his 18th) each went deep in the victory as the Rangers broke open a 1-0 game by scoring six times in the final three innings. Kohei Arihara (1-1) earned the win as he threw six scoreless innings, allowing four hits with no walks and three strikeouts. Taylor Hearn threw the final three innings, allowing no runs on no hits with no walks and five strikeouts, to earn his first save.
Dane Dunning takes the ball for his 24th start of the year for the Rangers in this contest. He is 3-6 with a 4.06 ERA, a 1.371 WHIP, 50 walks and 108 strikeouts over 124 innings of action on the year. Dunning earned the win in his last start, which came Thursday at home against the A’s. He threw six innings, allowing two runs on four hits with three walks and four strikeouts in a game the Rangers won by a 10-3 score. In his last three starts, Dunning is 2-0 with a 2.60 ERA, a 0.98 WHIP, seven walks and 15 strikeouts over 17.1 innings of work. This marks his second career start against the Rockies in this contest. He didn’t factor in the decision in his only career start against Colorado, which came on June 1, 2021. In that contest, he threw 4.2 innings, allowing two runs on six hits with no walks and three strikeouts in a game the Rangers dropped 3-2 in 11 innings. That start came at Coors Field, giving Dunning a passing familiarity with the park.