They are the Rodney Dangerfields of the baseball world. It seems that no matter what they do, they just get no respect. That’s not really fair because the Colorado Rockies are playing good baseball. It’s easy to find reasons to discredit this team – the rarified air of Colorado, a field where ridiculously high scoring games are common, the failure of pitching to perform there, the weakness of the National League West and so on. But this Rockies team might just be something special.
Bottom line is that someone has to win the NL West and because of the uniform quality (or lack thereof) of the division there really is no reason that it couldn’t be the Rockies. Of course there are all of the factors that were mentioned above, but this isn’t a team that is going to ever count on its pitching to bail them out, this Rockies team knows that in order to win they have to score, score often and then score some more.
Looking for big names on this team is a waste of time. After Todd Helton the best you can hope for is perhaps some recognizable names – Garret Atkins, Jose Mesa, Matt Holliday, Eli Marrero, Clint Barmes to name a few. This is largely a group of talented youngsters, most of whom have plied their trade together in the minors, learning how to hit, how to pitch, and how to play defense in the rarified air, not of Denver but of Colorado Springs just a short way down the pike.
They learned to win there and now they want to bring that knack to the big show. Maybe that will prove to be the way to win in Colorado. Rely on the homegrown talent that is accustomed to the local conditions and supplement it with pitching talent that may not thrive, but is good enough to survive at Coors Field and not mentally fall apart while waiting for the offense to do its thing.
There is no surprise that the Rockies are going to score a lot of runs at home, and that has been true of even bad Rockies teams over the last decade. Until now that has been a park effect not the mark of a good team. The current crop of players has raised the bar by 0.6 runs per game over last season so far. That makes the Rockies the third highest scoring team in the National League behind only Cincinnati and Milwaukee (who they trail only by .03 runs scored per game) as it stands today.
Pitching as always will remain a concern for this team but the emergence of Jeff Francis, who seems to be managing despite the altitude gives this team something that it has been lacking for far too long – a legitimate ace. Coupled with some hurlers ready to tough it out the Rockies may well be fielding the best team they have ever put on the field.
Yes, the division is weak. Yes, the altitude lends itself to high scoring games. Yes, the past is against them, but this Rockies team believes it can win – not just occasionally but every game. Fans in Denver keep looking at this team and waiting for the other shoe to drop – they expect mediocrity and they are surprised to see the Rockies are fighting for first in the division (and you can see it in the crowds at the park), but this team has held its own against eastern and central division foes so far this season. That might be a reason to believe the Rockies are for real and that they deserve at least a modicum of respect.
