After getting swept by the Dodgers in Los Angeles to open the second half of the season, the Red Sox badly needed a reset.

But it wouldn’t come Monday night, as they fell to the Colorado Rockies 9-8 in the 12th inning of yet another odd, frustrating game.

Despite the Rockies being in last place in the National League West, the odds were not in Boston’s favor. They were facing a left-handed starter, Austin Gomber, for the third game in a row, and carrying a thin, overworked bullpen, and dealing with Denver’s high altitude, which can cause unadjusted visiting players to feel lethargic and tired, but have trouble sleeping. In particular, the conditions prevented Kenley Jansen from joining the team on this leg of the trip; the veteran closer suffers from atrial fibrillation, and revealed on Sunday that he’d needed to have his heart shocked back into normal rhythm after pitching at Coors Field during the ’12, ’18, and ’22 seasons. Thus, the Red Sox carried a 25-man, closer-less roster to Colorado.

Tanner Houck wasn’t at the top of his game in his first career start at Coors Field, but he managed to give his team six innings. He gave up four earned runs, all in the bottom of the third. Things unraveled quickly in that frame: the Red Sox ace needed 33 pitches, and faced all nine Rockies batters. No. 9 hitter Aaron Schunk found himself safe on first with a single because the ball took a weird glance off third base, and Charlie Blackmon promptly homered to deep right for a 2-0 lead. Brendan Doyle’s double plated another run, and Michael Toglia’s single brought Doyle in to score.

“Third inning got to me a little bit,” Houck admitted to reporters. “Ultimately, bounced back and was able to pitch later into the game, getting to the six.”

Though Houck didn’t allow a run in any other inning, his first start of the second half was a battle from the start to finish. He described his pitch mix as “kind of flat, not as sharp as (usual).” Velocity was actually slightly up on his slider, sinker, and splitter, but horizontal break was down 3-4 inches on each pitch. The altitude impacts the baseballs as well as the ballplayers, but he wasn’t going to make any excuses.

“I think everyone knows that it affects it a little bit, but ultimately it comes down to just executing a little bit better,” the righty said.

“This is a tough, tough place,” Cora told reporters, referring to the altitude impact on pitchers. “He battled. He was able to use the sinker in the outing, and he gave us six (innings).”

But if the Red Sox were already befuddled by lefties before the All-Star break, facing and falling short against southpaws starters Jake Wrobleski and James Paxton in back-to-back games in Los Angeles took the situation from DEFCON 5 to DEFCON 3, at least. And through four innings on Monday night, the Boston bats had no answer to Austin Gomber, either. The Rockies starter entered the game having allowed 3-8 earned runs in seven of his eight starts since the beginning of June. But if not for Tyler O’Neill’s one-out double in the second, Gomber would’ve had a perfect game bid going.

Then, much like Houck in the third, the situation escalated quickly for Gomber in the fifth. O’Neill led off with a single, and after Masataka Yoshida struck out swinging, Romy Gonzalez singled, too. Ceddanne Rafaela’s flyout put Boston dangerously close to wasting a prime opportunity.

There’s something special about those moments when an unlikely hero puts the team on their back. On Monday night, it was Jamie Westbrook, the 29-year-old rookie infielder who spent 11 years in the minor leagues before getting called up by his hometown Red Sox at the start of June. With two on, two out, he demolished the second pitch from Gomber. Westbrook’s second home run of the year soared 426 feet to center, getting Boston on the board and slashing Colorado’s lead to one.

It was the jolt the lineup – 5-for-39 with runners in scoring position and 25 left on base over the Dodgers series – badly needed. Jarren Duran immediately ripped a standup triple. Already MLB’s leader in three-baggers, he’s the first Red Sox player with at least 11 in a season since Nomar Garciaparra in 2003. The knock also extended Duran’s hitting streak to six games, with at least one extra-base knock in each contest. He and Mookie Betts are the only leadoff men in franchise history to record at least 50 extra-baggers in the team’s first 100 games of a season.

After racing into third, Duran was able to jog home when Rob Refsnyder lined a singled through the left side of the infield. Westbrook then made a pair of strong defensive plays, helping Houck complete a quick fifth inning by catching Jake Cave stealing second.

The tie held until the bottom of the seventh, when home-plate umpire Mark Wegner missed a clear Strike 3 call, and Jacob Stallings doubled on the next pitch he saw from Josh Winckowski to put the Rockies back in front 5-4. It would prove pivotal about an hour later, when the game was stuck in extra innings.

‘Free baseball’ (the positive spin on extra innings) was the last thing a depleted Red Sox bullpen needed. So of course, it was exactly what they got. After Connor Wong re-tied the game with a leadoff homer in the top of the eighth, neither team did anything further before the end of regulation.

Thus, for the second time in four games, the Red Sox had to play a 10th inning. It seemed promising when they took a 7-5 lead on Dom Kelly’s pinch-hit leadoff double – scoring zombie-runner Duran – and Rafael Devers’ sacrifice fly. But without Jansen, and Chris Martin and Justin Slaten on the injured list, Kelly returned to the mound for a second inning. It was then that this road trip, already full of stunning and peculiar moments, saw another oddity: an intentional balk. The zombie runner advanced to third, then jogged home when Sam Hilliard crushed a two-run homer to re-tie the game. For the second time on the trip, the Red Sox had gone to extras and blown a two-run lead.

Without Devers’ RBI in the top of the inning, it would’ve been game-over. It nearly was in the bottom of the 11th, too, but a jaw-dropping play by Ceddanne Rafaela created a 12th inning. When Brendon Doyle’s knock was deflected off Greg Weissert, the rookie shortstop/centerfielder dove, grabbed the ball, bounced back up and made the throw to first.

Before the dozenth inning could get underway, however, Alex Cora was ejected. He got his money’s worth, arguing with Wegner, then left his boys to get the job done.

The Red Sox managed to retake the lead on a Wilyer Abreu two-out single, then immediately gave it back when Bailey Horn gave up a leadoff single to Jake Cave in the bottom of the 12th. The rookie southpaw loaded the bases, including a pair of intentional walks, a strategy that had already failed Boston more than once on the trip. With two outs and a full diamond, Chase Anderson entered, threw two pitches, and it was game over. After three hours and 25 minutes, Ezequiel Tovar’s single to center yielded Colorado’s 37th win in 101 games.

Hitting into too many double plays (3) and leaving too many men on base (7) aside, the Boston bats have shown a fair amount of fight in these games. But they shouldn’t have to fight against their own bullpen, and can’t continue to do so.

“We’ve been in all the games,” Houck told reporters. “Now it’s just closing it out and finishing strong.”

After five blown saves in four games – and without Jansen and the injured Chris Martin and Justin Slaten – a roster move is all but guaranteed.

“Loss always sucks,” said Houck, “But you know, you can learn a lot from, whether win or lose, you can learn a lot.”

In this case, everyone’s about to learn if the front office feels added pressure to bring in reinforcements sooner rather than later, or not add at all.