DENVER -- The ninth-inning rain delay was cruel, the ending crueler.

For seven innings Sunday afternoon, the Padres seemed well on their way to a rare sweep of the Rockies in Denver. Then Blake Snell’s ankle swelled, the skies opened and the bullpen surrendered leads in both the eighth and ninth innings en route to a brutal 5-4 loss at Coors Field.

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After an 85-minute delay, it took all of three batters until Nolan Jones settled matters. He launched Brent Honeywell’s hanging changeup into the upper deck in right field. The Padres had dropped yet another one-run game, falling to 4-12 on the season.

“It sucks,” said Jake Cronenworth, whose two-run homer in the fourth had given the Padres a lead. “We have the lead for the sweep there in the eighth. Just couldn’t finish it.”

A few thoughts on Sunday’s finale:

Snell was brilliant again … and unlucky 
Snell wasn’t merely dominant – he was stunningly efficient as well.

The veteran left-hander struck out 12 Rockies, one shy of his career high, without allowing a walk. He used his curveball brilliantly, inducing nine whiffs on 11 swings (plus three called strikes). Snell has posted a 0.75 ERA across his past four starts after allowing just one run in seven innings on Sunday. 

“He’s on a roll now,” Padres manager Bob Melvin said. “It’s similar to what we’ve seen in a lot of his second halves. The last three or four outings, he’s been really good, but today was probably the best.”

Snell allowed Ezequiel Tovar’s first-inning homer but was otherwise excellent -- and he did it all on 85 pitches. Snell has never completed eight innings in his career. If there were ever a day to push those limits, Sunday might’ve been it.

But in the bottom of the seventh, Snell took a 108 mph Randal Grichuk liner off his left ankle. He remained in the game to record the final out, but his ankle swelled up in the dugout. As such, Snell’s day was done, and he was off for an X-ray (which came back negative).

“I'd like to have finished the game,” Snell said. “That'd be the goal, right? Who knows? But I got hit.”

The Padres went all-in Friday and Saturday … and it burned them Sunday
Snell picked the perfect time for perhaps his most efficient start as a Padre – and a bad time to be struck by a line drive.

Melvin had managed his bullpen aggressively on Friday and Saturday. It paid off in the form of two victories. But it also left him short-handed on Sunday. Josh Hader wasn’t available after notching a pair of saves. Steven Wilson wasn’t available after working multiple innings on Saturday.

Nick Martinez evidently was available, despite pitching Friday and Saturday -- and Melvin was about to summon him after letting left-hander Tom Cosgrove face the lefty-hitting Ryan McMahon. But when McMahon’s solo homer tied the game, umpires called for the tarps.

“After the rain delay I wasn’t going to use him,” Melvin said. “After, this would’ve been his third day in a row, him warming up already.”

No Hader. No Wilson. Ultimately no Martinez, too. That left Melvin to call for Luis García in the eighth. García’s outing began with an infield single in which he failed to cover first base. Then, he surrendered a game-tying two-run homer to Coco Montes. That’s when the skies broke loose.

Rain, rain go away
Amid a downpour, the Padres escaped the eighth with an incredible diving catch from Juan Soto, who started a double play. In the ninth, they perhaps capitalized on the rain, scoring with the aid of an error and a wild pitch. 

But the Rockies responded instantly. McMahon’s homer put an end to Cosgrove’s franchise-record streak of 14 scoreless outings to begin his career. It was certainly raining hard enough for a potential delay. But after the game, Cosgrove wouldn’t use that as an excuse.

“I’ve pitched in rain before,” Cosgrove said. “I’ve pitched good in rain before. I don’t think that had too much to do with it. … It was a bad pitch; he hit it out.”

An hour and a half later, under sunnier skies, Honeywell surrendered Jones’ walk-off blast. A bitter ending to the Padres’ three-game winning streak.

“The way we’ve been playing, we feel like we’re back, situationally, to doing some good things,” Melvin said. “We just didn’t finish it out, and obviously the state of our bullpen had a little something to do with it.”