Michael Toglia didn’t even have to play one game under the watch of new Rockies president of baseball operations Paul DePodesta for him to decide he’d seen enough of the struggling slugger.

The Rockies designated Toglia for assignment Tuesday, likely bringing down the curtain on a time defined by bursts of power and strikeouts, strikeouts, strikeouts.

In 2025, Toglia had the highest strikeout rate among 392 players with at least 150 plate appearances, a ghastly 39.2 percent. His bursts of power — 11 home runs over 88 games in 2025, 24 in 116 games a year earlier — couldn’t compensate for it.

Toglia was hitting .194 when the Rockies sent him down to AAA Albuquerque on May 31. He crushed minor-league pitching and was called back up three weeks later, sizzling immediately upon returning to the big club, hitting 3 homers and 6 RBI in a four-game series at Washington. Toglia inched his average back above the Mendoza line and kept it there for nearly all of the next month.

But he went 2-for-23 over six games in the lineup, sending him back below .200, and he never returned. By the time the Rox sent him back down to Albuquerque, he lugged a .190/.250/.353 line with a ghastly 39.2-percent strikeout rate.

He completed the season in AAA and kept clobbering Pacific Coast League pitching while the Rockies gave looks to Warming Bernabel and Blaine Crim at first base down the stretch. Crim socked five homers in 15 games in the season’s final days.

Toglia wasn’t the only former Rockies first-round pick designated for assignment; the Rockies did the same with 2018 first-rounder Ryan Rolison. In 31 appearances last year — including one June start as an opener for Antonio Senzatela — the right-handed reliever was tagged for a 1.772 WHIP, a 7.02 ERA and 2.3 home runs allowed per nine innings.

ROCKIES MAKE FLURRY OF MOVES BEYOND TOGLIA

DePodesta was busy Tuesday, acquiring left-handed reliever Brennan Bernardino from the Boston Red Sox and selecting the contracts of three players for the 40-man roster — both of the Rockies’ 2022 first-round picks: pitcher Gabriel Hughes and outfielder Sterlin Thompson, and reliever Welinton Herrera, who reached AA last season and was one of the Rockies’ prospects sent to the Arizona Fall League.

The 34-year-old reliever endured a mixed-bag season in 2025; although his ERA and WHIP improved, his strikeout and walk rates declined.  Colorado sent outfielder Braiden Ward to Boston in exchange for Bernardino; Ward advanced as far as AAA last season.

Hughes, the No. 10 overall selection in 2022, started 23 games between AA Hartford and AAA Albuquerque in 2025, with another start for the club’s Arizona Complex League entry. He logged a 4.19 ERA and a 1.263 ERA, although his strikeout-to-walk ratio took a hit when he reached AAA; it was 1.66 over 14 starts for the Isotopes.

Thompson, the No. 31 pick in 2022, spent 2025 in Albuquerque, posting a .296/.392/.519 line at the hitter-friendly club and level. His AA line in Hartford was .243/.322/.395, compiled over 34 games in 2023 and 119 in 2024.

Herrera posted a 2.00 ERA over nine appearances in the Arizona Fall League after posting a .320 ERA over 52 appearances split between High-A Spokane and AA Hartford.