{"id":646452,"date":"2026-03-27T12:09:19","date_gmt":"2026-03-27T12:09:19","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/mlb\/646452\/"},"modified":"2026-03-27T12:09:19","modified_gmt":"2026-03-27T12:09:19","slug":"rockies-will-be-bad-but-they-will-not-be-boring","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/mlb\/646452\/","title":{"rendered":"Rockies will be bad, but they will not be boring"},"content":{"rendered":"

Every action<\/a> was an admission.<\/p>\n

Every hire<\/a> an indictment of last season. Or the last seven.<\/p>\n

Admit it, you grew disgusted with the Rockies<\/a>. Might have stopped going to games, leaving great seats for opposing team\u2019s fans. Maybe you gave up on them entirely.<\/p>\n

Hard to blame you.<\/a> The product the past three years has been major league baseball in name only<\/a>.\n<\/p>\n

A decade too late, the Rockies abandoned their insular thinking, fired dead weight president Greg Feasel and general manager Bill Schmidt. They ditched their AOL account. Exchanged their flip phones. And turned on Bluetooth.<\/p>\n

The Rockies are connected to reality, harsh as it is. They are no longer in a state of denial.<\/p>\n

With Walker Monfort in charge<\/a>, president of baseball operations Paul DePodesta and GM Josh Byrnes have been entrusted to excavate the Rockies from the ruins.\n<\/p>\n

The first step on a 1,000-mile journey begins Friday in the season opener at Miami.\t\t\t\t<\/p>\n

Could it be possible that arguably the worst team in baseball history won\u2019t even be the worst team in baseball this season?<\/p>\n

There is a plan. So, there is a chance. \u201cWe\u2019re Here For The Climb\u201d is the team\u2019s marketing slogan. It is catchier than \u201cNow We Suck Less Than Ever.\u201d<\/p>\n

The Rockies are asking for patience, recognizing this is likely a three-year project to return to relevance.<\/p>\n

They will be bad. But they will not be boring.<\/p>\n

\"OutfielderOutfielder Jordan Beck celebrates with teammates in the dugout after scoring the first run of game three during the 2026 Colorado Rockies spring training at Surprise Stadium in Surprise, Arizona on Feb. 22, 2026. The Colorado Rockies took on the Texas Rangers. (Photo by RJ Sangosti\/The Denver Post)<\/p>\n

The days of enjoyment will outnumber the days of embarrassment.<\/p>\n

There are a few reasons why. DePodesta has infused analytics into a Rockies organization that had been living in the Stone Age. And manager Warren Schaeffer hired coaches who understand the information and can deliver it to players in a snackable fashion.\n<\/p>\n

\u201cThe magic isn\u2019t in the word analytics. It has been around 25 years with Paul,\u201d Schaeffer said. \u201cHe\u2019s not some nerd who lives in the stratosphere. He\u2019s a great baseball guy. It is going to make us more efficient.\u201d<\/p>\n

DePodesta and Byrnes reconfigured the rotation around veterans with a plethora of pitches. Nothing is more demoralizing for a team trying to regain its balance than having its outcome determined by the third inning.<\/p>\n

\u201cHow many sports in the world when you have the ball in your hand are you not on offense? Our pitchers have to adopt that mentality. Yeah we are going to give up some hits and we are going to give up some homers. That happens (at Coors Field),\u201d DePodesta said. \u201cWe can\u2019t back down. We are going to relentlessly attack. Look, it might be a 15-round heavyweight fight. We might get bloodied. But we\u2019ve got to knock the other guy out.\u201d<\/p>\n

It is a change in mindset bordering on a lobotomy.<\/p>\n

The Rockies want to be on offense. Especially when they are on offense.<\/p>\n

\"ColoradoColorado Rockies center fielder Brenton Doyle (9) can\u2019t get ahold of the ball on a single hit by San Francisco Giants center fielder Jung Hoo Lee (51) in the 2nd inning at Coors Field in Denver, on Thursday, June 12, 2025. (Photo by Andy Cross\/The Denver Post)<\/p>\n

Anyone familiar with baseball at altitude knows pitching remains a problem. It will always be difficult. But the fact that the Rockies could not hit the past two seasons was absurd.\n<\/p>\n

No stadium awards contact like Coors Field. And the Rockies, instead, became human windmills, a trait amplified on the road where they averaged an MLB-worst 10.4 strikeouts per game over the past two years.\n<\/p>\n

This must change, starting at LoanDepot Park on Friday. There is no excuse for chasing and swinging and missing at this rate.<\/p>\n

\u201cThere is no doubt we have to get more guys on base. We have to have more balls in play,\u201d DePodesta said.<\/p>\n

The additions of super utilityman Willi Castro and TJ Rumfield provide a lens into how the Rockies\u2019 brass wants to change and improve.<\/p>\n

Castro brings lineup and positional versatility. He was an All-Star in 2024, delivering 48 extra-base hits. Even in a disappointing 2025 season, he struck out 24.4% of the time. Ryan McMahon, by comparison, whiffed in 32.2% of his plate appearances.\n<\/p>\n

Rumfield, the projected starting first baseman, struck out 18.3% in Triple-A. Michael Toglia, ditched by new management, posted a 39.1% K rate last season.\n<\/p>\n

The best Rockies lineups have always offered a blend of characteristics.<\/p>\n

\u201cWe need to be able to look at an individual, at his strengths, and determine how that puzzle piece fits. It is hard to find a guy who hits for average, gets on base, has power and is a great defender. Those are Hall of Famers,\u201d said DePodesta. \u201cBut if we can find guys who have elements of those and put the pieces together in just the right way, then as a team we can do all those things and cover for individual weaknesses. I do think we are going to be developing hitters who fit as winning pieces that ultimately will be part of a larger puzzle.\u201d<\/p>\n

Ambush in hitter\u2019s counts. Run a little bit, forever a foreign concept. Put pressure on the defense. Schaeffer is poised to be more aggressive. It won\u2019t translate in the standings, but the offense will have a few electrified strings on the acoustic guitar.<\/p>\n

The Rockies are more equipped to do damage with shortstop Ezequiel Tovar, who has legit pop, and a healthy Brenton Doyle. Mickey Moniak brings 25-home-run potential as the primary DH, and Jordan Beck and Jake McCarthy should combine for 25 dingers.\n<\/p>\n

It is fine if you don\u2019t give the Rockies the benefit of the doubt. They betrayed fans\u2019 trust and loyalty for far too long.<\/p>\n

They will have to improve by 20 wins to avoid becoming only the second team to lose 100 games in four straight seasons, joining the Washington Senators (1961-64).\n<\/p>\n

The starting pitching and the hitting have not been the only problems since 2023. It has been everything.<\/p>\n

There are times this season they are going to stink.<\/p>\n

But they are going to compete.<\/p>\n

Nobody is going to make any kind of promise. But, there will be progress, if not twinkles of excitement.<\/p>\n

Want more sports news? Sign up for the Sports Omelette to get all our analysis on Denver\u2019s teams.<\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"Every action was an admission. Every hire an indictment of last season. Or the last seven. Admit it,…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":646453,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[2405],"tags":[1485,5,1004,167,52,4316,1009,869,1381,2083,853,3568,4,1027,58626,4135,168,1494,185,430,151,8616,8053,27108,9130],"class_list":["post-646452","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-colorado-rockies","tag-analytics","tag-baseball","tag-brenton-doyle","tag-colorado","tag-colorado-rockies","tag-coloradorockies","tag-coors-field","tag-ezequiel-tovar","tag-jordan-beck","tag-josh-byrnes","tag-latest-headlines","tag-mickey-moniak","tag-mlb","tag-more-rockies-news","tag-paul-depodesta","tag-road","tag-rockies","tag-ryan-mcmahon","tag-sports","tag-sports-columnists","tag-spring-training","tag-strikeouts","tag-troy-renck","tag-walker-monfort","tag-warren-schaeffer"],"share_on_mastodon":{"url":"","error":""},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/mlb\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/646452","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=646452"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/mlb\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/646452\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/mlb\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/646453"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/mlb\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=646452"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/mlb\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=646452"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/mlb\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=646452"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}