{"id":641035,"date":"2026-03-24T17:23:36","date_gmt":"2026-03-24T17:23:36","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/mlb\/641035\/"},"modified":"2026-03-24T17:23:36","modified_gmt":"2026-03-24T17:23:36","slug":"why-colorado-rockies-washington-nationals-maintain-mlbs-worst-starting-rotations-2","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/mlb\/641035\/","title":{"rendered":"Why Colorado Rockies, Washington Nationals maintain MLB\u2019s worst starting rotations"},"content":{"rendered":"

Why Colorado Rockies, Washington Nationals maintain MLB\u2019s worst starting rotations<\/a> originally appeared on The Sporting News<\/a>. Add The Sporting News as a Preferred Source by clicking here<\/a>.<\/p>\n

The NL West favorites have the game\u2019s top two-way talent (Shohei Ohtani<\/a>), a batting order able to produce power and average, elite\u00a0defenders\u00a0and a deep starting rotation.<\/p>\n

Advertisement<\/p>\n

Former MLB general manager Jim Bowden, who writes for The Atlantic<\/a>, rated the Dodgers\u2019 starting five as the league’s best.<\/p>\n

Headlined by four potential aces, Yoshinobu Yamamoto, Blake Snell, Tyler Glasnow, and Ohtani, the Dodgers employ an elite, if not fragile, rotation. Yamamoto enters 2026 as the lone starter to compile at least 95 innings last season.<\/p>\n

If only the Colorado Rockies<\/a> and Washington Nationals<\/a> had such problems.<\/p>\n

Colorado Rockies\u00a0remain\u00a0in trouble<\/p>\n

Ranked by Bowden as the league\u2019s lowest-ranked starting rotation, the Rockies\u00a0likely will\u00a0open the campaign with one pitcher younger than 32-year-old Kyle Freeland, the projected ace. <\/p>\n

Advertisement<\/p>\n

Chase\u00a0Dollander, 24,\u00a0remains\u00a0the lone major-league-ready prospect.<\/p>\n

The others \u2013 Michael Lorenzen, 34, Jose\u00a0Quintana, 37, and Tomoyuki Sugano, 36 \u2013 remain journeymen stopgaps. The Rockies ranked No. 30 with a 5.97 earned run average last season. <\/p>\n

With elevated Coors\u00a0Field as\u00a0home,\u00a0don\u2019t\u00a0expect the\u00a0team’s\u00a0ERA to drop significantly until the team\u2019s entire pitching staff is revamped.<\/p>\n

Washington Nationals need new handles<\/p>\n

The most newsworthy aspect of the Nationals\u2019 projected starting rotation this season is not that Cade Cavalli can unleash a 100-mph fastball.\u00a0It\u2019s his new look, highlighted by a handlebar mustache. The Nationals need Cavelli to\u00a0maintain\u00a0command of his pitches and free-agent veterans Miles Mikolas and Zack Littell to bring more than personality to the staff.<\/p>\n

The Nationals\u2019 5.35 ERA ranked second-to-last in 2025. <\/p>\n

They could struggle to match that mark in\u00a02026.<\/p>\n

The Dodgers\u00a0seem to have\u00a0it all. The Rockies and Nationals need more. Much more.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"Why Colorado Rockies, Washington Nationals maintain MLB\u2019s worst starting rotations originally appeared on The Sporting News. Add The…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":641036,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":"","_share_on_mastodon":"0"},"categories":[2405],"tags":[5,114,3573,717,167,52,4316,39,3804,131,1022,371,123,4,168,468,1454,81959,3624,1605,775,786,71,313,5170],"class_list":{"0":"post-641035","1":"post","2":"type-post","3":"status-publish","4":"format-standard","5":"has-post-thumbnail","7":"category-colorado-rockies","8":"tag-baseball","9":"tag-blake-snell","10":"tag-cade-cavalli","11":"tag-chase-dollander","12":"tag-colorado","13":"tag-colorado-rockies","14":"tag-coloradorockies","15":"tag-dodgers","16":"tag-jim-bowden","17":"tag-jose-quintana","18":"tag-kyle-freeland","19":"tag-michael-lorenzen","20":"tag-miles-mikolas","21":"tag-mlb","22":"tag-rockies","23":"tag-shohei-ohtani","24":"tag-starting-rotation","25":"tag-the-atlantic","26":"tag-the-nationals","27":"tag-the-rockies","28":"tag-tomoyuki-sugano","29":"tag-tyler-glasnow","30":"tag-washington-nationals","31":"tag-yoshinobu-yamamoto","32":"tag-zack-littell"},"share_on_mastodon":{"url":"https:\/\/channels.im\/@mlb\/116285316661740559","error":""},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/mlb\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/641035","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/mlb\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/mlb\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/mlb\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/mlb\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=641035"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/mlb\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/641035\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/mlb\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/641036"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/mlb\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=641035"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/mlb\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=641035"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/mlb\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=641035"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}