The Rockies have passed the mathematical midpoint of their 162-game schedule and are at the traditional halfway defined by the All-Star Game.
In this, their 30th anniversary season, they could well lose a hundred or more games—for the first time ever.
With all due respect to the veteran players on this team, who don’t seem to have stopped playing hard for manager Bud Black, I must ask:
What’s to be gained by losing into triple digits with guys who will not be part of longer-range improvement (and who maybe can contribute to a turnaround by bringing young arms in trade)?
Why not find out if Michael Toglia has a future with the Rockies by putting him at first base for three solid months?
Why not give slugging Hunter Goodman, who hit 36 home runs across three levels last season and is bashing more in Double-A in ’23, a taste of Major League pitching, as well as what it takes to call games from behind the plate at Coors Field?
Does Elehuris Montero figure into the future—as a designated hitter, if not in the field?
Have a place for Sean Bouchard when he’s ready to return from the injured list yet this season; longer term, could he at least be a productive fourth outfielder?
Pair these guys with McMahon, Tovar, Jones and Doyle—and Rodgers (when he returns, which apparently could be soon—and see what the future holds.
It likely will not avert 100-plus losses this season (and might ensure it), but at least young players will gain experience.
(Outfielder Zac Veen, voted Offensive Player of the Year in the Arizona Fall League in 2022, should be ready next year. (His ’23 season ended with wrist surgery at the end of June.) So could “catcher-of-the-future” Drew Romo, the organization’s fourth-ranked prospect.
The Trade Deadline is fast approaching. Players who can’t keep Colorado from losing a hundred could possibly help contenders make the postseason, which makes them potentially attractive to “buyers.”
If they’re moved, they must fetch promising young arms, which the Rockies sorely need if they are to be competitive in the future. Every trade must be for pitching.
Already, resurgent Mike Moustakas has been dealt—for a High-A prospect, not immediate help.
Moving Randall Grichuk, who is beginning to show his usual power and is a quality defender, should bring another, maybe one who can be ready for prime time in 2024.
Likewise C.J. Cron, who is showing flashes of productivity since returning from a back problem; and, too, if Rodgers indeed comes back soon, maybe Harold Castro, a pleasant surprise at the plate whose versatility is a valued aspect in today’s game.
Making room for Goodman now and Romo next year probably means moving All-Star Elias Diaz. Some may gasp at the thought, but it’s not out of the question, depending on the answers to these questions:
Is he just becoming a valuable big-league catcher at the age of 32, with productive years ahead? Or is this his career year?
Can he bring a return worth giving up the team’s first All-Star catcher ever?
Lest you recoil at the thought of trading away so many veterans (even if the Rockies aren’t winning with them), consider a team that recently swept Colorado during its longest winning streak in more than 65 years and, at the All-Star Break, is in first place in the National League Central Division.
The Reds finished 2022 tied for last in the NL Central, losers of exactly 100 games.
The club absorbed the wrath and scorn of most Cincinnatians after trading its best-known and most-popular veterans (starters Luis Castillo and Tyler Mahle, and hitters Eugenio Suarez and Jesse Winker) to contenders for unproven but well-thought-of young players.
What happened?
When the Reds completed their three-game sweep of the Rockies, their lineup was a mixture of homegrown talent (Tyler Stephenson, Jonathan India, Matt McLain, Elly De La Cruz and TJ Friedl), trade pieces who have proven to be as good as advertised (Spencer Steer, Jake Fraley and Brandon Williamson), and a few veterans (most notably Joey Votto).
And—as our feeble President is wont to say—guess what:
In Cincinnati, these young Reds—23-8 since calling up De La Cruz—have elbowed their way into the city’s sports conversation alongside the Joe Burrow-led Bengals.
Imagine fans in Denver talking about the Rockies in the same breath with Sean Payton’s Broncos.
Denny Dressman is a veteran of 43 years in the newspaper business, including 25 at the Rocky Mountain News, where he began as executive sports editor. He is the author of 15 books, nine of them sports-related. You can write to Denny at dennydressman@comcast.net.