The favorable impression Friedrich and White made in San Diego found my long lost optimism just before it jumped off the cliff. Just one game, for sure, but I’m pumped because DOD finds himself in unfamiliar territory—a semblance of competition on the mound. After the trip to San Diego, I think we need to revisit the pitching situation once again.
STARTERS: Guthrie, Friedrich, Nicasio, Pomeranz and White are my choice for the starting rotation. I love the Jamie Moyer story but it’s time to give the younger arms the opportunity. By the time Jorge is ready to come back, we’ll have a better idea about the new bloods.
BULLPEN: Belisel, Betancourt for sure. Reynolds, Roenicke and Torres for the time being. I wish we could trade Esmil (as well as Jhoulys—should have done it in the spring when he had greater worth) but until then he has to stay. I think Brothers needs to go back to AAA and learn to pitch and not just throw. I’d bring Ottavino back up to replace him. I know, we need a left-hander because JT believes in this left/right b.s. so bring up Outman instead of Ottavino.
Let’s find out who can do the job on a consistent basis.
It would probably be a good time for Moyer to experience “hamstring soreness” that requires a DL stint
It seems like many are down on Moyer. I guess it doesn’t matter to some that unless Moyer, OR ANYONE ELSE, pitched near perfect games he was destined to lose. How can a pitcher win when he has the lowest run support in the NL? Maybe all of baseball. I didn’t check the stat today but the last time I checked it was .057!
I am a Moyer fan. It is great with so many young pitchers on the roster, to have living proof of the difference between throwing and pitching. However we have reached a point where these young guys have knocked the door down and entered the room. Is it appropriate to tell Friedrich, White, Pomaranz or Nicasio that they need to spend more time in AAA or alter their development by putting them in the bullpen? Some may think so, but I don’t. These kids are here and seem to be performing. I think the Rockies have to find out if these guys are truly ready. Chances are at least one of them are not ready. Sending Moyer to the pen feels wrong to me. Therefore, I advocate that he rest his sore hamstring while the kids take a couple of starts. It is likely that there will be a rotation spot for him when his DL stint is complete.
Or the ever popular biceps tendenitis,or lat strain,oblique pull,et.al.
Good point, Mike Raysfan. I also think the team fielding behind him is pretty bad as well. The point I’m trying to make is that DOD has options and hopefully this will light a fire under the entire staff. If Moyer can hold onto his job by beating out the others wonderful. My problem with Moyer is not the wins and loses as much as his inability to go long into games which taxes our bullpen. If the other starters were going 7 or more each time out, then he wouldn’t stand out as a weak link. Pomeranz needs to step it up as well. I think it’s a great situtation. Thank you Mr. Friedrich
Doc, i think you nailed it as to why Moyers starts have been so short…the fielding behind him is HORRIBLE…for some reason when he is on the mound the errors go up…they were talking about it last time and he by far had more errors behind him than any other pitcher on the team…remember the 2 dropped in the sun balls of CarGo were behind Moyer…
So, extended pitch count because of bad innings is one reason i think he doesn’t go longer…
Moyer isn’t giving us quality starts; we need that on a more consistent basis. Even if we give him a 4 or 5 run support, we don’t have much of a chance to win. Usually when he’s pitching in the 5th inning, he’s given up five runs already, most of them from the third time through lineup.
For example the Rox gave him a 5 run lead in the first against the Braves.
we also had 4 errors in that game…can’t remember if they were all with Moyer on the mound, but many were…errors extend innings and raise pitch counts, not to mention frustrating the pitcher…’
I’m not defending Moyer and think he is one of the weaker pitchers on the team, but I do want to be fair that he has really had to work harder than the other pitchers with our crappy play behind him…
It’s great that it seems that we may have some options.
Hopefully, we’ll have some more options before too long. Is Chatwood injured? I don’t recalll seeing him in the CS bos scores recently.
Bettis, one of our highest ranked pitching prospects, has been injured this whole season. Does anyone know when he might be healthy enough to be in the Drillers’ rotation?
Cabrera has pitched well at Tulsa. Anybody have any thoughts as to when he projects to be a Rockie?
Do any of the other Tulsa starters — Dan Houston, Parker Frazier, Nick Schmidt — all of whom seem to be pitching pretty well so far, project to be major leaguers?
Julian I think ideally the Rockies would like to have Cabrera pitch most of the year at AA Tulsa with a September callup. Bettis too needs to pitch at least 100 AA innings after he gets healthy with an outside chance of a September callup at this point.
Houston, Fraiser and Schmidt are pretty much fringy MLB starters that might have to move to the bullpen to make it in the Show. However as you point out all three are pitching well right now and still have the outside chance to make a MLB starting rotation.
I still really like Chatwood’s stuff and he might be the best of the bunch. Very young yet and developing some command with that stuff will eventually make or break him. He could be really good or he could just be Esmil Rogers in a couple years depending on how that development goes?
So all you that are ready to send Moyer packing, what happens when he goes 7 innings and allows 0 ER in LA and gets a win? Remember the last time the Rockies were losing earlier this year and could not get a quality start, who stepped up and got a win? Meanwhile Pomeranz seems happy to preserve his baby arm and pitch 4 innings every time out.
You sound as down on Pomeranz as some of us are down on Moyer. Pomeranz’ bumps are a result of baseball god’s interventions. (in-game incidents that cut his starts short) But I like what I’m seeing out of Pom; if there are no injuries then he will give us quality starts easily. I think some of us are still thinking of the Pomeranz starts in 2011, not this year. Meanwhile Moyer has shown that he’s good for two times through the lineup and then he gets run out of the game in the fifth inning. Exactly why I’m beating the drums to move Moyer to long relief role.
This blowing out the bullpen argument everyone keeps talking about is a bunch of crap. The Rockies usually carry twelve pitchers of which five are in theory starters, so that leaves seven arms for the bullpen. If Tracy simply learns that a relif pitcher might be capable of pitching to more than one batter or even better more than one inning, then he will have plenty of pitchers available every game.
BYW I for one absolutely HATE the Pomeranz move (sent to AAA). From what I see, Drew Pomeranz is a better left hander starter than Jamie Moyer at the MLB level right now. The Rockies are not going to win the World Series this year, however Pomeranz needs as much MLB development time as possible. Besides the fact that Pom is on my fantasty team, this is a really dumb move by the Rockies
Orange, well-said.
7 bullpen pitchers. Plus with an off day on Thursday, Tracy easily could’ve skipped over Moyer in the rotation and had him available in the bullpen for this series. The good bullpen pitchers — right now Betancourt, Belisle, and Reynolds — only see action when we’re winning or in close games. Since we haven’t been winning much other than in blowouts, they’ve seen pretty low workloads. Betancourt has thrown all of 13 innings this year.
Rogers (15 IP all year, on pace to pitch 80) and Brothers (12 IP, on pace for about 65) have NOT been overused. They’ve been crap, but not because of overuse. Roenicke’s been used a lot, but that’s because Tracy is scared to use guys like Escalona and Torres because, well, they suck.
So the workloads don’t strike me as a problem. It was a problem during the homestand when the starters were getting knocked out really early, but that will happen to a team every year.
I guess what I’m saying is it’s an excuse because you don’t want to come right out and say our bullpen beyond the top 3 sucks, and our starters have been huge disappointments.
I think that the question regarding Pomeranz and some other players is where is a better place to work on things: CS or the Rockies. If CS is a better place for Pomeranz to work through certain issues, then I’m OK sending him down to do that. It’s important that he be right for the long term. Yes, he may be better than Moyer right now, but short term I’d rather deal with Moyer and have Pomeranz’s long term prospects improve than lessen Pomeranz’s long term prospects if he can improve more in CS. Also, at some point the alternative to Pomeranz will also be DLR and not just Moyer. BTW, what’s the status on Chatwood? Is he injured? If so, when should he return to action?
This is where I strongly disagree because starting pitchers especially learn to pitch in the MLB by pitching in the MLB. Working on stuff in AAA simply destroys the young pitcher’s confidence that he can’t even get those hitters out, when actually for the most it is inferior defense and PCL ball parks. I think this Pom demotion is a huge mistake!!! He is pitching no differently than he was to open the season, if you were gonna send him to AAA anyway then would have been the appropriate time!
I had very little confidence in DanO and J Traxy – it is now at the zero mark!
OrangeRocks, I don’t necessarily disagree with you, I just posed it as a question as to which is better. I don’t really know. And I also have very little confidence in Tracy and not much in DOD.