Eli Whitney | April 6, 2026

After back-to-back losses to open their first home series of the season, the Colorado Rockies needed someone to set the tone on Sunday afternoon. Tomoyuki Sugano obliged, and Mickey Moniak made sure it counted. Colorado salvaged the series finale with a 4-1 win over the Philadelphia Phillies in front of 29,757 fans at Coors Field – a win that offered a brief reprieve from what had been a long and frustrating weekend at Coors Field.

The Rockies did not waste any time making their intentions clear. With two outs in the bottom of the first, Moniak sent a 1-2 pitch from Taijaun Walker over the right field wall for a solo home run. Hunter Goodman followed with a single, and TJ Rumfield wasted no time adding to the lead with a two-run shot on the very first pitch he saw, making it 3-0. It was the first time the Rockies had hit two home runs in the same inning since September 18, 2025, against Miami, and it came with the swiftness that has made this ballpark both a blessing and a curse for 30 years.

“He picked up right where he left off from last year,” Rockies manager Warren Schaeffer said about Moniak. “Just got a couple [of pitches] up to hit out of the ballpark. He was huge for us today.”

Moniak was not finished. In the fifth, he did it again – another solo shot off Walker, this time to right-center on a 1-2 pitch, his second home run of the afternoon. Both blasts came with two outs. Both came off the same pitcher. And both came against the franchise that made him the first overall pick in the 2016 draft –the organization that raised him, developed him, and ultimately moved on from him.

When asked if there was anything extra sweet about going twice against his former club, Moniak kept it simple.

“It’s always cool hitting two home runs in any game,” he said. “I’ve still got a lot of buddies over there. That’s the team that kind of raised me.” The numbers, of course, told a richer story. It was the third multi-home run game of his career.

Sugano was the other half of Sunday’s story – quiet, composed, and devastatingly effective. The 36-year-old Japanese veteran mixed his pitches with the kind of craft that only comes from over a decade of professional baseball, allowing just one run across six innings while striking out five and generating eight ground ball outs. He did it, notably, without his best pitch.

“He didn’t have the split today, which is one of his best pitches,” Schaeffer noted afterward. “Used the slider a lot, used the heater late. Just a good, solid mix that kept them off balance.”

Sugano himself was unfazed. “The mix of pitch selection is definitely my strength,” he said. “Toward the end of the outing, my splitter was working, so that was also good.”

His six innings represented the first quality start by a Rockies pitcher this season, and the first by a Japanese-born Rockies starter since Masato Yoshii on September 3, 2000. When Kyle Schwarber lifted a deep fly ball to center in the fifth with runners aboard – a ball that momentarily held its breath before dying on the warning track – Sugano came off the mound grinning.

“It was a huge out,” he said. “Depending on whether it was out or if it was a hit, that could have changed the ball game.”

Moniak was generous in crediting Sugano when the postgame questions turned his way.

“When he can go out there and set the tone, attack guys like he did, keep the pitch count down and go deep into the baseball game – he did it in his first start in Toronto, and then was able to do that again today against another really good team,” Moniak said “Just to have a guy like that go out there, veteran presence, throw five pitches at any point in the count – it’s something that’s really cool to have.”

Jaden Hill, Brennan Bernardino and Victor Vodnik handled the final three innings with the kind of quiet authority the bullpen has flashed all season. Vodnik was particularly sharp in the ninth, striking out three of the five batters he faced to nail down his first save of the year.

The bullpen has been a steady hand through a rocky start to the season, and Schaeffer believes the depth in his staff will pay dividends as the season rolls on. “We’ve got good length, which helps, and it’s going to help preserve our one-inning guys throughout the year,” he said, “You’re going to see fresher guys in August and September. That’s the plan.”

Rumfield’s two-run blast in the first was his second home run of the season and first at Coors Field. He has now reached base safely in eight of his first nine career games, and his .345 average through nine games is beginning to look like something more than a small-sample mirage.

Schaeffer has been measured in his praise, but the admiration is unmistakable. “It just seems to be who he is,” he said. “The quality of the at-bat is very high. He’s willing to take his walks, and he can do damage.”

The win snapped Colorado’s nine-game losing streak to Philadelphia – the longest in the history of the matchup – and delivered the Rockies their first victory at Coors Field in 2026. They may have lost the series, but the manner in which they won on Sunday – efficiently, aggressively, with their starter going deep into the game and their offense striking early – offered a glimpse of what this team is capable of when the pieces fall into place.

“It’ll come,” Moniak said of the offense finding its footing. “Baseball’s got its ebbs and flows. Guys are going to find their swings. I’ve got all the confidence in the world in this team and our coaching staff.” At 3-6, the Rockies have a long way to go, but Sunday felt like something worth building on.