MLB: THE NOW AND FUTURE COLORADO ROCKIES

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“SPORTS NOTEBOOK” posts its columns Tuesday and Friday of every week---Ed. & Publ., Marvin Leibstone.

MLB:   Thursday afternoon at Coors Field, the National League-West’s fourth place team, the Colorado Rockies (29 wins/46 losses), demonstrated how good a team they can really be, that they could play baseball exceptionally well and in high gear. During the bottom half of the first inning versus the Washington Nationals, the Rockies put five runs on the board with hit after hit, and during the second they put up two, score 7-0. This surely surprised, since the Rockies had just lost two games in a row to the Nationals, 12-5 on Tuesday, 11-5 on Wednesday, giving them a poor record for the month of June: seven wins, 17 losses.

First up for the Rockies, bottom half of the first inning vs. the Nat’s was center fielder Dexter Fowler, punching a line drive-single. Rockies second baseman, Marco Scutaro, followed with a single, sending Fowler to second. Next, left fielder Carlos Gonzalez sent the ball into right field, pushing Fowler home. Up next was first baseman, Todd Helton; he walked. After, third baseman Chris Nelson singled and Scutaro went home, Rockies ahead 2-0, with men on first and second. Next to the plate was right fielder, Tyler Colvin---he hit a two RBI home run, Rockies leading 5-0 . . . Bottom of the second inning, a Gonzalez single started the base running that pushed the score forward.

Then the Nat’s found holes in the Rockies defense and put up 10 runs during subsequent innings, matching the Rockies 10. The dueling into an 11^th inning allowed the Rockies to put up an extra run, final score: Rockies 11, Nat’s 10.

Somewhat comforting during this awful MLB season for the Colorado Rockies is having split the recent four game series with the Nat’s, a team tied for first in the NL with the Dodgers. Signs of competence matter when a team is trying to dig itself out of a hole that’s been dug mainly from successive losing streaks---six straight losses in May, eight losses in a row during June.

            At best, the Rockies could have but a 36/46 win/loss record by the MLB All Star break. This means that the Rockies would have to win all of 10 games scheduled between now and July 9---three on the road vs. the Padres, four against the Mariners, and three against the Nat’s at Washington, D.C. But to date, the Rockies longest winning streak for the year occurred in May, four won against the Astros, followed by a win vs. the Dodgers. Right now, the team average is below .400. Only something close to daily miracles could give the Rockies a post-season billet. Best that the team concentrate on training days, on making improvements for the 2013 MLB season, which if done right could put the Rockies at .500 by September while positioning players for being the best that they could be starting next April.

Important, of course, is a realistic look at the Rockies strengths and vulnerabilities, and there are many of both. For one thing, as we’ve mentioned before on this page, the Rockies have been a work-in-progress, not a finalized ball club capable of settling on a single goal such as selection for post-season play. Recent rostering portrays a new franchise, e.g., yesterday’s line-up showed that only Dexter Fowler, Carlos Gonzalez and Todd Helton were regulars in the previous year’s line-ups. The current year’s list of starting pitchers has certainly been new: LHP Christian Friedrich, LHP Josh Outman, RHP Jeremy Guthrie, others. There’s no choice here but for Manager Jim Tracy and his pitching coach to be running a laboratory even as late as June. The lab’s current experiment is a four-man starter rotation and a set number of pitches that, when thrown, will mean relief from the bull pen. Whether this forces the new starters to pitch more strikes and strengthens them for being afield every four days won’t be known until late August. Noted is that enough of the Rockies pitching staff have thrown enough strikeouts for Tracy to believe in them, to hang with bets that they can improve, example: the Rockies bull pen has been lowering its ERA. With star pitcher Jorge De La Rosa returning in late August, and the four man rotation working to advantage, September could prove to be the Rockies perfect trial run for 2013, while lifting the team’s win/loss record.

Looking at Rockies hitting, on the bright side of the team’s 17 losses in June, only two were without hits producing runs. Oddly, while last being a .500 team on April 27, the Rockies are leading the National League in extra base hits, accruing 251. Too, during its eight June wins, the Rockies have scored a total of 62 runs, a figure that is near to, at or above that of the best eight games won by most MLB teams that have been .500 or over since May. Best among the team’s hitters are Carlos Gonzalez, having achieved more base holdings than any other National league player this year---167 total bases. Too, he’s third in the NL re. total number of RBI’s achieved---53, as of last Tuesday. Also, Dexter Fowler leads the National League in achievement of triples. Among the newer players, talent could do well in 2013 from upticks in on-base consistency from Colvin (he’s got eight home runs this year), catcher Wilin Rosario, infielder Jordan Pacheco, infielder/outfielder Michael Cuddyer, and Marco Scutaro (his walk-off RBI-single won yesterday’s game).  

So---saying “Wait ‘til next year” needn’t be an empty slogan repeated by Rockies field boss Tracy and General Manager, Dan O’Dowd, even if delivered forcefully before the All Star break, even if the Rockies win less than half of the team’s upcoming 10 games.

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