MLB Game Preview - LA Dodgers at Colorado

Sat Apr 8, 2017 8:10 PM EDT

DENVER -- After winning four of their first five games this season, the Colorado Rockies face a formidable task Saturday when Los Angeles Dodgers ace Clayton Kershaw will oppose them.

Kershaw is 1-0 with a 1.29 ERA this season. On Opening Day, he allowed two runs (one earned) in seven innings against San Diego with no walks and eight strikeouts in a crisp 84-pitch outing.

In 32 career starts against the Rockies, Kershaw is 18-5 with a 3.08 ERA with 223 strikeouts and 67 walks in 201 1/3 innings while limiting Rockies hitters to a .218 average. At Coors Field, Kershaw is 8-3 with a 4.63 ERA in 17 starts.

Kershaw will be trying to even the series for the Dodgers, who fell 2-1 to the Rockies in their home opener. The loss left the Dodgers 3-2 this season with both losses coming in games started by left-handers, continuing a disturbing trend from the 2016 season.

They were 24-27 against left-handed starters last year, including the postseason. In the regular season, the Dodgers ranked a distant last against left-handed starters with a .214 batting average and .623 OPS.

The Dodgers have lost to two left-handers -- San Diego's Clayton Richard, who held them scoreless for eight innings Tuesday, and Colorado's Kyle Freeland, who limited the Dodgers to one run in six innings Friday while winning his major league debut in his hometown in the Rockies' home opener.

Right-hander Jon Gray will start Saturday against the Dodgers. But they will face Rockies left-hander Tyler Anderson on Sunday and are scheduled to face Chicago Cubs left-handers Jon Lester and Brett Anderson in the first two games of a three-game series at Wrigley Field on Monday and Wednesday.

"Yeah, it's one of those things until we change it, it's going to be the talk," Dodgers manager Dave Roberts said of his team's struggles against left-handed starters.

Gray is 2-3 with a 4.11 ERA in six career starts against the Dodgers. He's 2-0 with a 2.81 ERA against them in three career starts at Coors Field, all last season.

Gray started for the Rockies on Opening Day at Milwaukee and wasn't involved in the decision in a 7-5 win over the Brewers.

Gray began the game with four scoreless innings and was sitting on a 4-0 lead but left after giving up a single, a walk, a single, a run-scoring double and a two-run double, both hits on first pitches up and over the plate, to start the fifth.

One of the runners yjsy Gray left on base scored, and he was charged with six hits and five runs in four-plus innings.

"I don't know whether he has to do anything different (against the Dodgers)," Rockies manager Bud Black said. "If you break it down hitter to hitter, pitch to pitch, he only threw like 11 pitches (in the fifth). What he has to do is realize at that moment, there's a momentum shift. We had the momentum. They now have the momentum of two guys on, nobody out, and a little bit of the crowd with it.

"That's when you have to heighten your awareness, heighten your focus and (realize) this is a momentum shift, and I got to make some pitches."