Ishii Can’t Top This

What better place than Coors Field for a hot team to keep the good times rolling?

Baseball’s top launching pad seemingly provided a favorable environment for the Dodgers to extend their winning streak, but Colorado starter Joe Kennedy didn’t cooperate Tuesday night in the Rockies’ 7-1 victory.

Kennedy easily handled the Dodgers and outperformed Kazuhisa Ishii in a one-sided battle of left-handers, pitching seven strong innings to help end their winning streak at five games in front of 22,169.

The 24-year-old left-hander kept the Dodgers off-balance in his third consecutive quality start. Kennedy gave up six hits and had seven strikeouts without a walk, working as efficiently as he did against the Dodgers in 2002 while starting for the Tampa Bay Devil Rays.

Kennedy avoided the pitfalls of pitching at Coors Field, and Ishii didn’t keep pace.

“I thought he was about as sharp as anybody we’ve seen,” batting instructor Tim Wallach said. “No matter where you are, if you pitch that well, it’s going to be really tough to be beat.”

Said Manager Jim Tracy: “When you have a club that has been swinging the bat the way we have been, to shut us down in the manner which he did ... you have to give him a lot of credit.”

Kennedy also dominated the Dodgers in an interleague game two seasons ago, pitching a six-hitter in an 11-2 victory at Tropicana Field.

On Tuesday, Kennedy (2-0) again mixed his pitches well and stayed ahead in counts (throwing 70 strikes in 107 pitches), something Ishii (2-1) rarely did in a four-inning outing.

Ishii gave up consecutive home runs to Charles Johnson (No. 4) and Jeromy Burnitz (No. 3) -- a blast estimated at 452 feet -- in the second. Vinny Castilla connected for his fifth homer against Ishii as the Rockies took command with three runs in the third for a 5-0 lead.

Ishii appeared out of sync from the outset, and his earned-run average ballooned from 3.55 to 6.48. He failed to locate the strike zone consistently with fastballs and breaking pitches, throwing 38 strikes in 71 pitches.

After earning victories with effective outings in his first two starts, Ishii suffered a setback against the Rockies.

“Not too good,” pitching coach Jim Colborn said of Ishii’s performance. “He just never got anything going.

“His off-speed pitches were OK, but I don’t know if he threw a fastball in a good location. He never got a sequence going that was effective.”

Adrian Beltre continued his torrid start with two of the Dodgers’ eight hits, providing their only run with his team-leading fifth homer in the seventh after the Rockies had raced to a 7-0 lead against Ishii.

Paul Lo Duca’s hitting streak ended at 11 games, and Colorado reliever Turk Wendell escaped a bases-loaded jam in the ninth, striking out pinch-hitter Jason Grabowski to end the game.

With the way Kennedy pitched, the Dodgers said they never had a chance.

“The thing that Joe did, which is absolutely imperative in this ballpark, is that you have to throw strikes, you have to pitch ahead of hitters,” said Tracy, whose team dropped to 5-2 on the trip with two games remaining.

“When he needed to make a pitch, he made it and got us out. His pitches were located very well, and he used his breaking ball and changeup very effectively.”

Ishii would have liked to earn a similar assessment of his work.

“They just got all those runs early in the game,” Ishii said through an interpreter.

“I don’t like pitching here, but it’s the same for any pitcher here and the other team, so I’m not going to make excuses.”

Ishii said he would try to accentuate the positive.

“I feel bad toward my team just for giving up so many runs and letting the team down, but I had some good pitches today,” he said.

“They were just hitting the good pitches I was throwing.”