Jim Tracy just announced that the Rockies will be going with a 4 man rotation, putting Guthrie in the bullpen. The starters will be held to 75 pitches per start. His logic behind the move?
We don’t know what’s going to come out of this. It’s not benefiting him or the club. We’re throwing too many bullpen innings. We had to do something that was unconventional. We have 2 rookies in rotation. You have to be very careful. You can’t just throw them loose on 3 days rest.
The pitching staff was notified in a meeting just prior to batting practice of the new setup…
Unbelievable…talk about grasping at straws…this must REALLY make Pomeranz feel great – we’d rather go with four guys than bring you back up…
How do you rest the bullpen by giving your starters a 75 pitch count limit??? Amazing that he didn’t work through that logic…
Although the way they’ve played, 75 pitches would be an improvement…
That was my question too. Go from 5 to 4 starters, limit them to a few innings each, and the bullpen gets rested.
Desperate times call for desperate measures.
But this just about ensures that the overworked bullpen will be taxed even further. How many Rockies pitchers this season have gotten through even five innings on 75 pitches? That would indicate the stressed-out relievers are almost guaranteed to have to pick up four innings of work each home game.
Desperate, indeed.
The very things you mention were discussed on Dave and Dave this afternoon.
The wheels are coming off this train. I wonder if the Monforts will notice.
This just proves that Tracy is the worst manager in baseball! How does this sound like a good idea to anyone???????? The sad thing is DanO and the Monfarts probably think this is the best idea ever!!! I can honestly say I feel embarrassed to be a fan of this franchise right now. This is just bad.
All the starters have stunk, so all this does is limit the stinkfest. Also, by limiting the starter’s innings, their ERA won’t go any higher than the embarrassing level it is now.
I don’t see this team winning any of the remaining 6 games on this trip. If that happens, this team will be coming home having lost 16 of 17. Will that be enough for the Monforts to see the light and pull the plug on this circus? I’d like to think so, but I know better.
I was out of internet range for a few days and I’m just catching up on some news, so excuse me if someone’s pointed this out already.
This is O’Dowd, not Tracy. Why do I say that? Because the last team to try a 4-man rotation (which lasted less than one time through the 4 men) was the Rockies in about 2004. Clint Hurdle was managing. It was a desperation move then, it’s a desperation move now. It didn’t do a damn thing to make the team better then, it won’t do a damn thing to make the team better now. It will prevent Guthrie from having any chance of stringing together a few good starts (let’s say 4 out of his next 5 or 6 or something like that) and reestablishing a little trade value. He’s still owed more than 4 million bucks for the remainder of the year, so all you can hope for is someone to take on a good chunk of that balance in a pure salary dump. But if Guthrie drops back to 30 pitch mop-up outings it’ll make it that much harder to move him to a contender looking for a 5th starter. I wouldn’t be surprised if he gets DFA’d rather than moving to the bullpen for any length of time. And who decided that Guthrie, terrible as he’s been, is actually a worse option going forward than, say, Jeff Francis? Or Alex White or Christian Friedrich for that matter? So it’s a desperatation move, and like most desperation moves it’s stupid.
Now, there’s absolutely nothing wrong with the idea of a 4-man rotation. In fact, the idea of the benefits of the 4-man rotation is almost Chapter 1 in the book called The Saber Geek’s Crusade to Change the Way Baseball is Managed. Why trot out that horrible 5th starter every 5th game when your other starters are only working 6 innings if you’re lucky? But it’s the kind of thing you want to commit to in the offseason, then implement in spring training in a logical, calm, collected, thoughtful, non-O’Dowdian way. Expect the New, Improved 4-Stiff Rotation to last roughly as long as the previous version.
Just get on with the fire sale already, and start the housecleaning with the Best GM in All of Baseball.
I am absolutely shocked by this horrible front office decision, not that it makes any difference for 2012, but this severely limits the remaining starts that should be going to guys like Pomeranz, Nicasio, Cabrera, Houston, Schmidt, Gardner, etc. The 2012 MLB starting experience for these pitchers is hugely important, and needs to happen now rather than later.
FYI Pomeranz pitched six innings of no hit baseball tonight for Colorado Springs. For the life of me, I can not understand why he needs to waste those precious innings at AAA instead of gaining MLB experience that will be extremely useful going into 21013.
If the Rockies front office is so concerned about blowing out the bullpen, then they should ship Giambi out and bring up another pitcher. Giambi is totally useless for a MLB baseball club going nowhere and nearly finished with interleague play.
Really this is just unbelievable! I could easily argue for a six man rotation moreso than a four man rotation, as making any kind of logical sense for the Rockies. It is not like their first four starters are that much better than their next four starters – they are all pretty bad at this point.
Orange, that’s right. You could pick any one of 6 guys now as the best available starter
In fact, you could make a case for.Moscoso. so why not just go all in and piece together emergency starts on a regular basis, 4 relievers per game? Really, what’s the advantage of this 75 pitch hybrid starter-reliever thing?
I wouldn’t mind if this was the start of a commitmentto a 4 man rotation, but we all know O’Dowd doesn’t have the guts to do that. I checked the history: on May 3, 2004 the Rockies announced they were going with a 4 man rotation for the rest of the season. By May 10 the 5 man rotation had returned. Why do we always haveto be the organization that experiments with week long stunts?
Ag,great to have you back!But I have to ask,where the hell on the planet can one go with no internet access? Actually none of my business,just joshin’ you.This new “plan”makes so little sense I see no reason to give it a second thought.
Gary, there is a place right outside Helena, Montana called Canyon Ferry Lake my family and I vacation every summer where I can only get dial up Internet service. No broadband or cell coverage. I sometimes take the boat to the middle of the lake and get one bar on my cell phone and check the baseball scores. I guess I won’t have to worry about doing that this year. So to answer your question, there are still a few places in this country where you can’t get Internet.
That’s great.Renews my faith in the beauty that is the West!
After reading through your excellent comments, this made me realize that this latest move by MFLJT/BIBDOD is a lot like a crazy move I thought of a couple of weeks ago. Since every Rockies starter falls apart the 2nd time through the opposing batting order, why not schedule 2 starting pitchers per game? Let the first starter pitch the first 2-3 innings, then bring the second starter in. Hopefully the two of them in tandem can go about 6, and you almost have yourself a quality start. Crazy idea, but I think this is essentially what the Rockies have in mind.
Drew Pomeranz nearly throws no hitter in Colorado Springs. He just made this decision look a lot more stupid!
Perhaps Drew did need time in CS to work through his issues…i know many have beat the drum of why is he “working” on something he can work on in the bigs, but when he first came to us he had a few VERY impressive CS outings, and then his first start with the team was amazing (2 hits, 0 runs over 5) – while it wasn’t completely obvious he was “missing” something in the way he was pitching, compared to when he first came over, he did have a few rough CS outings…now that he is pitching a “nearly no hitter” again, it is like the same Pomeranz and the experiment may have worked…
I am ALL for making sure our future ace is pitching correctly, having good habits…you can’t trust the pitchers themselves to tell us if they are hurting (Jimenez/Chacin proved that) and if the team is seeing something wrong, get it working right before they hurt themselves or fall out of what makes them great…
Having said that, I don’t know how much I trust our pitching coaches throughout the system, so it could all be for naught…then again, if Dac is the problem then i’d rather he was in CS under Bo McLaughlin…
Isn’t it better for Pomeranz to be safe in CS than in the clutches of Apodaca in Denver?
1000% agree. Apodaca would ruin Pomeranz and everyone knows it. Plus, they get to delay Drew’s contract schedule a year by keeping him down. They shall not touch Drew until Apodaca is on a plane to wherever he will spend retirement.
I’m not opposed to this idea as long as it carries some common sense. I don’t think we need to worry about any of our “starters” throwing a shutout up to their 75 pitch limit, and if they did, great. Since the idea is so save the bullpen, the next guy who comes in, should be allowed to pitch another 75 if he’s doing well. Instead, we get the Jim Tracy show which begins in the 7th inning no matter what. Last night—other than 1 pitch—Moscoso was doing a good job. Why take him out? It’s only human nature to have off nights, so why not go with the hot hand? But no, everyone gets to warm up and tire their arms because our WMIB has to show the world the perils of micromanaging.
Like Ag. I was out of town for 4 or 5 days and while I did have internet access, I didn’t have much time to pursue websites. I only watched bits and pieces of the game last night but while catching up with stuff I read either in the paper or from the DP online about this experiment. One word can describe it. DESPERATION. These guys are all grasping at straws and frankly I don’t care who came up with idea, I would fire them all. Rockies are depressing. I may have to start following Euro Cup Soccer which I have no interest in.
For all the reasons articulately expressed by all of you, this seems like a really dumb idea. The Tulsa Drillers are sending three starting pitchers and one reliever to their all star game. Is it realistic that any of these guys could pitch for the Rockies this season?
What is better than 5 HORRIBLE starting pitchers? 4 HORRIBLE starting pitchers.
Outman vs lefties: 219/273/452
Outman vs righties: 333/414/549
In other words: He turns lefties into a lineup of Scutaro 2012 quality. He turns righties into a lineup of CarGos. And those splits have persisted over his career. They had the right idea about turning him into a reliever. He could be a very valuable lefty in the pen. Why mess with him now by turning him back into a 75 pitch swing man (let’s face it, that’s what this 4-man rotation pitch limit thing is — creating a staff full of swingmen plus Belisle, Betancourt, and Brothers).
Alex White didn’t sound thrilled about it. His reaction in the DP: I can’t talk about it, I’ve got to get ready for a start. Read: there goes my night out drinking in Philly. He’s in no position to complain. But he has been one of the few bright spots in this rotation. His groundball rate is getting way up into Aaron Cook territory, and take away 3-4 gopher balls and we’re all excited about him. So why mess with his schedule/development too? It all sounds like making a bad situation even worse.
I could see this if a team had 4 veteran SPers, late in the season, making a run for the playoffs, and the other starting options were injured or ineffective.
But this doesn’t describe the Rockies. Not even close. Lets face it – we suck, and should be building for the future. How do you do that? Let White, Pomeranz, Nicasio, Outman, Chatwood, etc. go out and make their starts! This gets back to my fundamental biggest JT complaint. HE TINKERS TOO MUCH! Always shifting lineups, batting orders, the Sunday bulls**t, etc. Here’s a fact……….we’re going nowhere until we get a new Manager and coaching staff. Need a new GM as well. And why we’re at hit, a new scouting/player development department as well!
There………I feel better!
Throwing a fastball at Colorado Springs puts the same amount of stress on an arm as throwing a fastball in Denver. The only difference is the hitters at the MLB level are somewhat better at hitting that fastball.
The pitching coach issues noted above aside, Pomeranz needs to be facing MLB hitters instead of AAA hitters. He is not rehabbing anything, he is just pitching, so let him pitch to real hitters so he can learn how to get them out. Is this concept really that difficult to understand?
While the Rockies MLB losing streak continues, their best starting pitcher plays meaningless games for the Sky Sox, but nope the Rockies front office is just so darn smart?
Tulo having surgery tomorrow diagnosed with some kind of core muscle tear near groin region not sure the exact name for it, no timetable for his return atm
BTW exactly what are we SAVING the bullpen FOR anyway?
UPDATE – Tulo will have surgery on left groin tomorrow to remove scar tissue on nerve. Not classified as sports hernia. But will be out for a while
It’s unfortunate this wasn’t diagnosed within a few days after he left the game May 31. OTOH, this may be an unusual case that defied easy diagnosis.
Alex, agreed. They waited a long time before flying him to see the specialist in Philly.
Media is all over the place with this. I agree though. If you plan on losing 100 games, there should be no urgency in bringing him back. Give him plenty of time to heal … and hope that was the problem.
Roy Oswalt to make season debut Friday night for the Rangers against the Rockies
Tulo out at least 6 weeks!!!
What an awesome year to be a Rockies fan! Wow!
betting Tulo back in 10 days…hell, who among us couldn’t take arthro to the groin and head to work tomorrow! ; )
Hope it goes well and no issues.
go ROX
Well since we are on our way to win maybe another 30-40 games, let’s rest Helton, Tulo, Cargo, get rid of Giambi (or make him a coach). Then get rid of the owner (let’s all pitch in some $$). Then get rid of the GM & most coaches. Now we’re changing the culture here. Then play the AA & AAA guys and then have a better measurement for next year. Impossible but hey, I have a dream!
Go Rockies! But I will not attend another game until some REAL change has occured.