Jon Gray began to answer the question and then paused.

“That’s a tough question. I’m not really sure what is … ” he said before looking down in reflection. “ … Like, the fix for it,” he continued, referring to his troubles away from Coors Field this season.

“I know it’s my command. … I’m still searching for that one thing I need to find that’ll help me locate.”

Skies remain gray on the road for Gray. That was true literally and figuratively in the Rockies’ 7-0 loss to the Pirates in Game 1 of their seven-inning doubleheader at PNC Park on Saturday.

• Box score

Gray, who owns a 2.36 ERA at Coors Field this year, continued to struggle on the road, making it through only three innings on a cold, drizzly afternoon in Pittsburgh because of spotty control. He gave up three runs on four hits, walking three and striking out two on 73 pitches. His road ERA for the season stands at 6.75.

It was a leadoff walk to Wilmer Difo in the second inning that proved costly for Gray -- Difo came around to score after back-to-back singles by Cole Tucker and Michael Perez. Gray then walked his counterpart, Pirates starter J.T. Brubaker, and that was followed by a fielder’s choice to plate Tucker. Perez then scored on a sacrifice fly to make it 3-0.

Pittsburgh scored three more times against reliever Jhoulys Chacín in the fifth on Bryan Reynolds’ two-run homer, a Gregory Polanco triple and an RBI fielder’s choice by Tucker.

Gray’s pitches, particularly his four-seam fastball, had significantly more run to them, resulting in missed location, many times just off the plate. When a Rockies pitcher has such stark home-road splits, Coors Field is immediately looked to as the culprit -- but usually because the problems are in Denver, not away from there.

Gray has been pitching in the Majors for a long time -- this is his seventh season. It’s not as if he’s always pitched poorly on the road. But this season, it’s become a pattern.

“It’s been something I’ve had to adjust to in the past,” Gray said. “But I don’t think I’ve ever been this bad on the road. I feel like my stuff has moved more on the road, even breaking balls. But right now it seems like only my fastball is moving on the road.”

• Elbow inflammation sends Story to IL

The average horizontal break on Gray’s fastball Saturday was two inches below his season average. But in terms of vertical break, it was averaging three inches more than usual, according to Statcast.

Much is made of the so-called “Coors hangover” for hitters who have to adjust to seeing much more break on pitches when they go on the road and play at sea level. But what about the detrimental effect on pitchers? 

“There is an adjustment, for sure, that you have to make,” manager Bud Black said. “But again, Jon, this is his [seventh] year of pitching in the big leagues and he’s aware of what he needs to do to get the ball in the strike zone. Today he wasn’t able to do it.” 

The question for Gray and the Rockies is a familiar one: Will he ever put it all together consistently?

“The awareness is there for pitchers that it’s gonna have a little bit more movement, especially on a day like today with heavy air, a little bit muggy and it was drizzling,” Black said. “But we have to make adjustments for that as pitchers. And Jon couldn’t quite get that today. He just didn’t have great feel for the fastball.”

Black said the Rockies haven’t identified any one common issue that is leading to Gray’s road troubles so far this season. He added that they’re going to be looking at it “a little closer” moving forward as the road losses mount, both for Gray and for the Rockies overall.

Much like Gray, the Rockies as a team are floundering on the road this season, dropping to 3-21 away from Denver. Colorado was also shut out for the ninth time in 2021 -- it was shut out four times during the pandemic-shortened 2020 campaign, and seven times in all of 2019.

“Sometimes I can get kind of distraught thinking about the next start or last start or whatever, but I’m just doing what’s in front of me,” Gray said. “That’s the best I can do. Hopefully we can do that collectively as a team.”