Dodgers have to own up to wild 8-5 loss to Rockies DENVER - More than 800 miles and a time zone removed from where Magic Johnson smiled, cried and promised to lower the cost of parking, there was baseball to be played. If the Wednesday news conference at Dodger Stadium offered a case study in public relations, the Dodgers' 8-5, walk-off defeat to the Colorado Rockies at Coors Field provided an examination of chaos theory. The Dodgers blew two leads and erased two deficits. Clayton Kershaw gave up three home runs for the first time in his career. Rockies first baseman Todd Helton was credited with a putout on a crucial sixth-inning groundout by Jerry Hairston Jr. without touching him or the base. The madness came to an abrupt halt when pinch-hitter Jason Giambi hit a three-run home run against Scott Elbert in the ninth inning. "It's a good game, man," Hairston said. If we played badly, it'd be different. But we didn't. It's how it goes sometimes. The Dodgers, who dropped two of three games in Denver, move on to Chicago with a National League-best record of 17-8. They will begin a three-game series against the Cubs on Friday. The Dodgers took a 1-0 lead in the third inning when Mark Ellis singled in A.J. Ellis. But the Rockies went ahead, 2-1, as Carlos Gonzalez hit a solo home run in the fourth inning and Wilin Rosario added another in the fifth. The most bizarre sequence of the game occurred in the sixth inning. With two out and Andre Ethier on first base, Hairston hit a grounder to third baseman Chris Nelson, who made a diving stop. To block Nelson's wide one-hop throw, Helton moved several feet off first base. First base umpire Tim Welke called Hairston out. "I was surprised," Hairston said. To be honest, I thought Helton had backpicked and Ethier got thrown out. Later, first base coach Davey Lopes told him what had happened. I was like, 'What?' Hairston said. Manager Don Mattingly charged out of the dugout to protest the call. Mattingly spread his arms to illustrate how far Helton had strayed from the bag. He removed his cap. Even as he retreated to the dugout, he continued screaming. Helton acknowledged that what everyone saw happened. "It wasn't in the same neighborhood," Helton said. It was 970. Denver's primary area code is 303. The umpires declined to speak to a pool reporter after the game. The call, which deprived the Dodgers an an-bat with a man in scoring position, turned out to be crucial. Hairston drove in Matt Kemp and Ethier on an eighth-inning double, allowing the Dodgers to reclaim the lead, 3-2. But Kershaw gave up the tying run in the bottom half of the inning on a single by Dexter Fowler. Gonzalez followed with his second home run of the game to put the Rockies up, 5-3. "We kept giving up leads," said Kershaw, who was charged with five runs and seven hits in 7 1/3 innings. It makes it a bit worse for sure. The Rockies would experience something similar in the top of the ninth inning. Rafael Betancourt was an out away from closing out the win when Rockies Manager Jim Tracy elected to walk Kemp with a man on first. Dee Gordon doubled, driving in two runs to tie the score, 5-5. With Kenley Jansen and Josh Lindblom unavailable to pitch in relief, Mattingly decided to send Jamey Wright back out for the bottom of the ninth. Wright, who recorded the final two outs of the eighth, walked the first two batters. With one out and runners on second and third, Mattingly called on left-hander Scott Elbert to face the left-handed-hitting Giambi. The Dodgers moved Ethier from right field to the infield. After throwing a ball, Elbert lobbed something over the plate to try to even the count. Giambi whacked it over the center-field wall. "He got a good pitch to hit and he did what he was supposed to do with it," Elbert said.