DENVER -- The Dodgers are a week removed from the All-Star break and they're still waiting for their first quality start of the second half of the season.
The rotation that kept the weak-hitting Dodgers in contention by posting a 3.98 earned-run average in the first half of the season has been a liability so far in the second.
Heading into a Friday night meeting with the Washington Nationals that marks the start of a 10-game homestand, the Dodgers' starters are a combined 0-3 with an 8.77 ERA. They're averaging less than 4 1/3 innings per start.
"It's our strength and it's going to have to be our strength," Manager Joe Torre said, alluding to how his team still can't hit. "We're going to have to pitch better than we've pitched on this trip."
The six-game trip that started in Arizona concluded on Wednesday with a 5-3 loss to the Colorado Rockies at Coors Field in which starter Hiroki Kuroda was hurt by the mile-high altitude much the way Clayton Kershaw and Eric Stults were in the first two games of the series.
By dropping the rubber match of the three-game set, the Dodgers let the Rockies finish their seven-game homestand with a 6-1 mark and climb to within five games of them for second place in the National League West.
Kuroda gave up five runs and nine hits over six innings and lost for the second time since the break. He was 2-0 with a 1.24 ERA in the three games leading up to the midseason intermission, a stretch that included a shutout of the Atlanta Braves in which he had a perfect game through seven innings.
The five runs charged to Kuroda were scored in the first three innings. He gave up two runs in a four-hit first and three in the third, when the Rockies started the inning with three consecutive extra-base hits. Jeff Baker tripled and scored on a double by Matt Holliday, who scored on a double by Brad Hawpe. Ian Stewart singled home Hawpe.
Kuroda acknowledged that the ballpark's reputation had an impact on him. He didn't throw many sliders in the first three innings and when he did, he usually missed the strike zone.
"I was told that breaking balls don't break the same here," Kuroda said. "What I threw wasn't what I imagined I would throw and that might've affected me."
Pitching coach Rick Honeycutt said he was unsure of the effect, if any, the four days of the All-Star break had on the pitchers. Kuroda and Chad Billingsley were deprived of bullpen sessions and Derek Lowe went 10 days between starts.
