DENVER – The Colorado Rockies were rolling along to their sixth consecutive victory when disaster struck in the form of a hard liner off starting pitcher Aaron Cook’s lower right leg.

Suddenly, another big night for Troy Tulowitzki was just an afterthought.

Tulowitzki homered twice in Colorado’s 9-2 victory over the struggling Cincinnati Reds, but the Rockies lost Cook to a broken leg when Joey Votto’s comebacker got him in the sixth inning Wednesday.

“That breaks your heart that something like this would happen to him,” Rockies pitching coach Bob Apodaca said.

With the win, Colorado remains 4 1/2 games behind the Atlanta Braves in the NL wild-card race.

Despite their fourth straight loss, the Reds still lead the NL Central by six games over St. Louis. The Cardinals lost 8-1 at Milwaukee.

“Another chance to pick up the game, but you’ve got to look at the bright side,” Reds manager Dusty Baker said. “We didn’t lose any ground either and it’s one less game on the schedule. We’ve got to feel fortunate it happened, but we’ve got to win.”

Bronson Arroyo (14-10) was hit hard, yielding seven runs in 4 1/3 innings and surrendering a season-high three homers.

BREWERS 8, CARDINALS 1: Ryan Braun hit a three-run homer as host Milwaukee roughed up St. Louis rookie Jaime Garcia. Albert Pujols hit his 36th homer in the first for the Cardinals. Garcia (13-7) career-high seven runs as his ERA rose to 2.69.

ASTROS 4, CUBS 0: In Chicago, Brett Myers struck out eight in seven crisp innings, and Hunter Pence homered for Houston.

PHILLIES 10, MARLINS 6: Ryan Howard homered and had six RBI as host Philadelphia backed Cole Hamels (10-10), who tossed four-hit ball over seven innings.

BRAVES 9, PIRATES 3: Omar Infante had three hits and Derek Lowe beat host Pittsburgh for the 10th straight time as Atlanta got a badly needed win. The Braves had lost three in a row to fall out of the NL East lead.

DIAMONDBACKS 3, GIANTS 1: Daniel Hudson (5-1) pitched seven effective innings as host Arizona snapped San Francisco’s four-game winning streak.

METS 3, NATIONALS 2: Pinch-hitter Nick Evans hit a tiebreaking double in the seventh inning, rewarding R.A. Dickey (10-6) as New York won in Washington.