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Webb pitches D-Backs to postseason

Sep 29, 2007 - 4:23 AM DENVER (Ticker) -- Brandon Webb and his sinker cooled off the Colorado Rockies and put the Arizona Diamondabcks into the postseason for the first time since 2002.

Webb pitched seven stellar innings and Conor Jackson homered as the Diamondbacks clinched at least a wild card berth with a 4-2 victory over the Rockies, who had their franchise-record 11-game winning streak and possible playoff bid come to an end.

The Diamondbacks (90-70)reduced their magic number to two for clinching the National League West, as San Diego (89-71) remained one game behind after a 6-3 victory over the Milwaukee Brewers.

"I've been through a few of these with 2001 being the ultimate, but I don't think I've ever been around a team effort like this one," Diamondbacks manager Bob Melvin said.

Meanwhile, Colorado (87-73) was eliminated from NL West title contention and fell two games behind the Padres in the wild card with two games left.

"We have to come back and win two and we need a little help from a bunch of people, but we'll worry about that tomorrow," Rockies third baseman Garrett Atkins said.

"We still feel can we do it," Rockies starter Jeff Francis said. "We still feel we have to run the table to do it, and we know we can."

Webb, who was slated to pitch Thursday at Pittsburgh but was pushed back due to soggy weather there, allowed two runs and eight hits with two walks and two strikeouts. The reigning Cy Young Award winner recorded 16 ground-ball outs and just two fly-ball outs.

"Talk about coming up big," Melvin said. "He's the only guy we wanted on the mound today. There was talk about him not being able to beat the Rockies. If this was a playoff game, which it ended up being for us, I don't care who the team is, we want Brandon Webb on the mound."

"They've been hot and had great at-bats all year," Webb said. "It's one of the best lineups in the National League if not the best. The run they were going on, I knew it was going to be tough. To come out here and do this, it makes it really sweet,"

The righthander cruised through six innings with a 4-1 lead until running into a little trouble in the seventh. Atkins lined a single to left and Brad Hawpe followed with a run-scoring double to center field to halve the deficit.

After a sacrifice moved Hawpe to third, Webb recorded his second strikeout of the game - against Cory Sullivan. Pinch hitter Ian Stewart drew a walk, but Webb got Kaz Matsui to beat the ball into the ground to shortstop to escape.

"I labored a little bit and didn't locate well and I fell behind a couple of batters," Webb said. "They got a couple hits there and Hawpe hit a great pitch. I battled and they ended up scoring one but I got through it."

Brandon Lyon yielded a one-out double to Matt Holliday in a scoreless eighth and Jose Valverde worked around a pair of ninth-inning walks to log his major league-best 47th save.

Francis (17-9) entered with 17 wins, tied for the single-season high in franchise history and 7-1 with a 3.35 ERA in 13 career starts against Arizona, but the lefthander was hurt by an old nemesis, Jackson, in the third inning.

The Diamondbacks first baseman blasted an 0-1 high fastball over the left field wall for a 3-0 lead. The homer was the fourth in 22 career at-bats for Jackson off Francis.

"I have no idea and I don't have an answer," Jackson said. "He's one of those guys that I have good numbers off and I have no idea how. He's got dirty stuff and keeps the ball away. Luckily I got a good pitch in the middle of the plate."

"I thought we could get in on him." Francis said. "Obviously he was cheating a little bit in. I don't know. I don't know exactly where the pitch was, but obviously we could have done something else."

Jackson helped the D-Backs take a 1-0 lead when he drew a leadoff walk from Francis in the second. Arizona loaded the bases with one out and Augie Ojeda delivered a sacrifice fly to right field.

Colorado got a run back in the bottom half when Holliday grounded a single up the middle to score Matsui. Stephen Drew capped the scoring for Arizona with an RBI single in the sixth that provided a 4-1 lead. Francis allowed four runs and seven hits in six innings.

"We had a lot of Webb to deal with," Rockies manager Clint Hurdle said. "We had a couple opportunities and we didn't get that big barrel on the ball like we had been."