Zack Greinke suffers first loss as Dodgers fall to Rockies, 7-1

To the list of things that had to happen one day, and finally did, you can now add Zack Greinke losing a game in 2015.

Which isn’t to say Greinke did not pitch extremely well in the Dodgers’ 7-1 loss to the Rockies before a Dodger Stadium crowd of 48,378 on Saturday night.

Greinke pitched as well as he has at any time in starting the season 5-0 with a 1.52 earned-run average. He just did not pitch quite as well as Colorado’s Jorge De La Rosa.

Greinke made one early mistake, surrendering a solo home run to Carlos Gonzalez in the first inning. That was the only run he gave up in his six innings, but it was enough to tag him with his first loss in 15 starts.

In his 14 previous starts, he had gone 10-0 with a 1.94 ERA. His last loss was Aug. 9, 2014, to Milwaukee.

But on Saturday, with De La Rosa recording 19 consecutive outs after Enrique Hernandez doubled in the first inning and Jimmy Rollins was safe on an error, one run loomed very large. Then Sergio Santos took over in the seventh, and there went the night’s suspense.

Santos gave up a two-run homer to Daniel Descalso in the seventh and a two-run homer to Nolan Arenado in the eighth. Suddenly, a tight, 1-0 game was a 6-0 Colorado rout. On the bright side, in the eighth inning, Santos did his Kenley Jansen imitation and struck out four.

For Greinke, it was one of those deserved-a-better-fate nights. He did not walk a batter and struck out five in his six innings, holding the Rockies to four hits. He was helped by a sprinting, basket catch at the wall in the fourth inning by Hernandez on a drive by Michael McKenry.

Still, his record fell to 5-1, and his ERA remained steady at 1.52.

The Dodgers managed only two hits off De La Rosa, the Colorado ace who entered the game 0-2 with a 9.56 ERA. His streak of 19 consecutive outs ended when Howie Kendrick hit a bullet to Descalso at short with one out in the seventh, the hard-hit ball bouncing off his chest for what was ruled an error.

De La Rosa left the game in the eighth after planting a leg hard to field a Scott Van Slyke tapper. In his 7 1/3 innings, De La Rosa held the Dodgers scoreless on two hits and no walks. He struck out three.

The Dodgers avoided their second shutout when they finally pushed a run across in the ninth against right-hander Scott Oberg.

The Dodgers loaded the bases on a hit batter, a double by Rollins and a walk to Kendrick. Oberg hit Justin Turner with a pitch to force in one run, but then struck out Alex Guerrero and Van Slyke to end it.