MLB Game Preview - Colorado at Miami

Fri Mar 29, 2019 7:10 PM EDT

Friday's game between the host Miami Marlins and the Colorado Rockies will offer an intriguing pitching matchup between right-handers German Marquez and Trevor Richards.

Marquez set the Rockies record last season with 230 strikeouts. He also finished eighth in the National League with a 2.95 road ERA.

He has a tough act to follow. Colorado's Kyle Freeland allowed just two hits and one run in seven innings on Thursday as the Rockies beat the Marlins 6-3 on Opening Day.

But as good as Freeland is -- and he won 17 games last season and finished fourth in the Cy Young race -- there are some who believe Marquez is the true Rockies ace.

Marquez, who has two plus breaking pitches, most notably his slider, had a 2.61 ERA after the All-Star game and finished the season with a 14-11 record and a 3.77 ERA.

"My mindset," Marquez said, "is attacking hitters."

Miami, meanwhile, will counter with Richards, who went 4-9 with a 4.42 ERA as a rookie last season but appears to be much improved.

Richards, who has an average fastball but one of the best changeups in the league, added a curve this year, and it certainly looked good in spring training. True, those are just exhibitions, but Richards' 1.86 ERA and 0.62 WHIP this spring were eye-catching.

His changeup last year produced a 36.3 percent strikeout percentage and a .165 batting average, which are both outstanding. So if his added curveball is anywhere as good as his change, the Marlins could have something special.

Batters hit .276 against Richards in the first half of the 2018 season but just .229 after the All-Star Game.

"We'll go mainly fastball, changeup, curveball," Richards said of his 2019 arsenal.

Richards is also working on a cut fastball.

"That's a work in progress -- trial by error," Richards said. "I'm toying with it, and we will see how it comes along."

Richards' fastball is far from overpowering, generally checking in at 92 mph. Batters hit .310 off his four-seam fastball last season, which means that the off-speed offerings are crucial for Richards.

"He really has to locate his fastball," Marlins manager Don Mattingly said. "He needs a breaking ball -- something going down -- to make batters honor his fastball.

"His changeup is as good as it gets, but if we narrow him to just two pitches, it gets him in trouble."

Richards will face a tough Rockies lineup that includes left fielder David Dahl, who went 3-for-4 with two runs scored on Thursday, and shortstop Trevor Story, who homered.

Story's homer was no surprise, as he hit 88 long balls from 2016 to 2018. That is the major-league record for homers by a shortstop in his first three seasons.

"We have a long and deep lineup," Story said after his homer on Thursday. "We have no easy outs."

Thursday's game was scoreless in the fourth inning when the Marlins made two crucial errors. Shortstop Miguel Rojas, an outstanding fielder, threw wild high, and center fielder Lewis Brinson failed to cleanly field a base hit that hopped his way. Those miscues led to a four-run Rockies inning that broke the game open.

"We didn't play a crisp game," Mattingly said. "We made mistakes that led to runs."

There were some Marlins highlights, however. Right fielder Garrett Cooper threw a runner out at third with a strong one-hop toss. And Miami hit three solo homers -- by pinch-hitters J.T. Riddle and Neil Walker and by starting catcher Jorge Alfaro.

Walker and Alfaro played their first games in a Marlins uniform. In fact, Walker's homer came on his first Marlins at-bat.

--Field Level Media