April 3rd, 2024

The Rockies are 1-5 to start the season after a brutal series in Arizona where they could not get out of the first inning without the Diamondbacks putting up runs, and an even more brutal start to a series in Chicago.

Arizona ended up with 9 first inning runs across the four game set. Fortunately, the Rockies found some footing on Saturday, getting shutout stuff from the bullpen after Austin Gomber gave up 4 runs in 4.2 IP and sending 9 runs across the plate.

Without that Saturday win, the Rockies fanbase would be in absolute pandemonium and national media ire would hit new highs, if that’s not already the case after a pair of back-breaking losses to the Cubs on Monday and Tuesday. If it wasn’t for Michael Toglia going yard, the Rockies would have been shut out in back to back games.

Rightfully, some fans are panicking and some are going the extra mile to pack up their things and ditch Rockies baseball for now. On the bright side, we’re 6 games in and plenty can and will change but, to be clear, this is as bad as the Rockies have looked–perhaps ever.

For now, some strong impressions have been made, both positive and negative. Should we be buying or selling these early season storylines?

Starting Pitching Woes

As mentioned above, the Rockies starters could not get out of the first inning against Arizona unscathed, until Dakota Hudson navigated 5+ scoreless against Chicago, before The Error™️. Through 6 games, the Rockies starter’s ERA sits at 10.17, an unacceptable mark.

Of course, Kyle Freeland’s nightmare pair of starts inflate that figure, but no matter how you slice it, the Rockies staff hasn’t looked good. Cal Quantrill did not start off strong, and Austin Gomber’s start was just passable, though Ryan Feltner and Dakota Hudson piggybacked two solid starts together.

Lost in the cards here are the lineup additions Arizona made this offseason as they now boast a potentially top tier lineup in baseball. While they lack multiple superstar talents like the Dodgers, most nights the Diamondbacks don’t have a hitter in the lineup that pitchers can look at as a sigh of relief. The Rockies needed to pitch better, but the Diamondbacks lineup was aggressive and hard to navigate through.

We should be buying the rotation struggles–this won’t be a great staff, but improvement is absolutely on the way. Kyle Freeland got ambushed against Arizona and then couldn’t locate pitches against Chicago like we’re used to seeing him do. At some point, he will find some middle ground.

Cal Quantrill will likely have more struggles as he implements his new-ish splitter, but he’s a pitcher’s pitcher and will find ways to get through 5 innings or more almost every time.

Austin Gomber showed promise in his first outing, though he made one critical mistake to Lourdes Gurriel Jr. that ended up in the seats. Ryan Feltner looked electric most of his outing, but did not get picked up by his defense. Dakota Hudson frankly looked hittable, but commanded his stuff well and avoided any big hits.

The fact that the backend all held their own and that it was the Rockies two best starters that have struggled most should instill hope that this unit can in fact improve significantly on last year’s rag-tag injury replacement group.

Verdict: Buying in part, selling in part -> Progress will be made, but the struggles aren’t going away overnight

Defensive Headaches

Are we seeing a complete repeat from last year? Early in 2023, the Rockies defense was abysmal; combining for -16 Outs Above Average (OAA) in March and April. From there on, the Rockies defense was good for 15 OAA the rest of the season. For whatever reason, guys like Ryan McMahon and Ezequiel Tovar struggled early last year before finding their groove.

Both of those players haven’t looked themselves on defense in the early going and Nolan Jones, after an up and down rookie season in the field, has looked plain nervous, making two errors already that most players will never make in their career.

This team is too talented on the defensive side to continue the putrid performance so far. Brenton Doyle, Ezequiel Tovar, Ryan McMahon, and Brendan Rodgers have all been Gold Glove caliber in their careers to date and Nolan Jones showed plenty of upside last year.

Things will turn around defensively for this squad, but it needs to happen now.

Verdict: Sell -> Nolan Jones won’t keep making errors on routine plays and the rest of the squad will also lock in

Lockdown in Relief

If you take away Rule 5 pick Anthony Molina’s struggles (11 ER in 3.1 IP), the Rockies bullpen has allowed just 4 runs in 20 innings pitched. While a couple arms have narrowly escaped damage, Nick Mears, Victor Vodnik, and Jalen Beeks have been rock solid so far.

Once the bullpen’s core of Justin Lawrence, Jake Bird, and Tyler Kinley hit the ground running, this group could be very effective. Regression is likely to strike somewhere, but the Rockies have clearly made an effort to get more power in the bullpen (Rockies relievers rank 2nd in MLB for average fastball velocity) and it’s paying off.

Like the defense, we may see a repeat of 2023, at this rate though. The 2023 bullpen was dynamic to start the year, but after enough starts by the rotation of less than 5 innings, the group got taxed late in the season and began to give up more runs.

Verdict: Buy -> This is a talented bullpen and the early success isn’t surprising, though the rotation needs to take the stress off

You Just Know They’re Gonna Hit, Right? Right?

I try to avoid inserting direct commentary into my writing, but I get too passionate about this topic. The narrative–purported internally and externally–that the Rockies will always hit because they play half their games at Coors Field and will eventually catch fire is nonsense.

Without the “Coors Hangover” justification, we are 6 games into the season and the Rockies have 16 runs, with 9 of them coming in one game. The club is hitting .204 with a .586 OPS. Of course that means better is coming; no matter how bad a ballclub is, every team at least posts an OPS in the mid .600s.

Still, this Rockies lineup has struggled and much of it comes down to two befuddling data points; the club has the 2nd highest swing rate on pitches out of the zone while they have just the 16th highest swing rate on pitches in the zone. That second metric doesn’t mean much on it’s own but it is shocking juxtaposed with the chase swing percentage.

The Rockies aren’t an overly aggressive team but they’re not making good swing decisions as a group and that may continue to limit success.

Fortunately, there are some positive signs. The Rockies are 8th in average exit velocity, 3rd in zone-contact percentage, and have the 2nd lowest soft-contact percentage.

Hitters like Jones, Rodgers, and Bryant will right the ship, but will the offense ever be all that good this year? Several years running of ranking at or near the bottom of the league in park-adjusted metrics suggest not. Figuring out the offense is a much bigger issue than it may seem.

Verdict: Sell -> This team won’t hit this poorly all season, but the lineup is leaps and bounds from resembling a “good” offense

Man, has this season been frustrating or what? It seems like everything that can go wrong has gone wrong. It’s easy to tune in thinking, “it can’t get worse than last night, can it?” only for it to in fact get worse.

The Rockies are scraping the bottom in three key areas and they will improve defensively, offensively, and in the rotation, but will it be enough to keep fans interested?

(Credit to Joe Rondone of The Arizona Republic for the thumbnail image)