Rockies Beat Schmidt, Pirates

Jason Schmidt has gone more than two months without winning a game for the Pittsburgh Pirates. Thursday, the right-hander decided it wasn't all his fault.

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"I don't see anybody really mad that we're losing eight out of 10," Schmidt said. "Come to the park every day and it's the same thing. I think something needs to be done. We need to go out and bust our butts every game and come to the park ready to play."

"We've got a lot of guys giving 100 percent, but we also have a lot of guys who are just going through the motions. You come in and everyone's happy like we won 10 in a row and that's not how it is."

Schmidt says there's a profound difference from last year when the weak NL Central allowed the Pirates to stay in contention until the last week of the season. They finished in second place.

"We had great chemistry last year," he said. "We knew we didn't have the best team in the world, but we wanted to prove everybody wrong. I just don't see that this year."

Pittsburgh has lost six of seven and is a season-low 13 games under .500.

Schmidt (8-9) is 0-8 since he became the NL's first eight-game winner June 1. He has the longest losing streak by a Pittsburgh pitcher since Jose DeLeon lost 11 straight decisions in 1985. He allowd four runs, three earned, in seven innings.

He was out-pitched by John Thomson (6-8), who held the Pirates to four hits with two walks and five strikeouts. He followed a similar performance by Jamey Wright as the two combined for the first consecutive complete games in Rockies history.

"It was one of the hottest days we've had this year, too," Colorado manager Don Baylor said. "He threw strikes, he worked the inside of the plate and his fastball was really explosive. Even in the ninth inning, he was still at 93 and 94."

Thomson said he was motivated by Wright's performance. The two have grown up in the Rockies organization and they compete with each other.

"We push each other and we help each other," he said.

Dante Bichette hit his 200th career home run. Bichette's 17th home run of the season came after Neifi Perez singled.

"I wasn't even aware of it," Bichette said of the milestone. "I really haven't been swinging the bat too well lately and that was on my mind more than anything."

Colorado had taken a 2-1 lead in the sixth. Todd Helton and John Vander Wal hit one-out singles and Mike Lansing doubled in a run. The tiebreaking run scored on Keith Osik's passed ball.

The Pirates took a 1-0 lead in the fifth against Thomson on Schmidt's sacrifice fly.

Helton led off the eighth with a double off Jeff Tabaka and scored on Lansing's single.

The Rockies finished their trip through Chicago and Pittsburgh 4-3, breaking a streak of seven consecutive non-winning trips. Colorado hadn't had a winning trip since it was 3-2 in Florida and Atlanta from April 22-26.

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