The 5 (Main) Reasons We Sucked in 2008

So here goes the start of what should be an epic season recap of your 2008 Colorado Rockies here at Frost Brewed Baseball. Epic only in the sense that I might use big words occasionally, hell, I might even write in another language (Italian, anyone?) because this year was far from memorable for the Rox. To give due credit to both sides of the coin (the positive and the negative) I'm going to highlight both because even in a 74-88 season that followed the franchise's first World Series appearance, it couldn't have been all bad. The following however, could be construed as the baseball equivalent of listening to the Jonas Brothers music, or watching the new Indiana Jones, or getting nut-punched by a blind midget wearing a Raiders jersey, or.....well, you get the idea.

1) Tulo's first half
- I've heard of the sophomore slump but Tulo's first half of play gave new meaning to the term. I'm not sure if God was trying to humble our fair Tulo after signing his huge contract in the offseason, or if Tulo's acting skills pained God personally (he did, of course, create such geniuses as Paul Newman in his own image), or perhaps Tulo was just getting too smug for the man upstairs because there was almost no earthly explanation for Tulo's early season struggles. He was hitting about .150 in April before tearing a tendon near his groin (a pain I wouldn't even wish upon Al Davis.......ok, I totally would.) After his 2007 season, the greatest for any rookie shortstop in National League history (.291, 24, 99, 11 errors, 989 fielding percentage) he did not rush out of the gate in 2008. He was committing errors, struggling mightily with runners in scoring position, not hitting for power, and looked like his supreme confidence might have been shaken. Perhaps he was putting too much pressure on himself to play well after becoming one of the cornerstones of our franchise and forgot that he, in fact, was more talented than most people on the field. He became susceptible to the high fastball and would swing at anything that even grazed the dirt. Though it wasn't his fault by any means for the team's faceplant to start the season, he was one of the easy scapegoats. He then came off the DL only to go back on a few weeks later after throwing a temper tantrum and shattering his bat after being pulled from a game, slicing his palm. When he returned he was hitting .166. To paraphrase Paul Harvey, soon, you'll get the rest of the story...

2) The complete and utter failure of our offseason signings
Yes, I'm talking to you Kip Wells, Mark Redman, Josh Towers, Micah Bowie, Livan Hernandez (though that was technically a trade), and last but not least.....Ladies and Gentlemen, here he is, the WORST free agent signing of the season....he's number 51 in your programs, number 2,635, 455 in your hearts....LUIS VIZCAINO!!! That's right folks, Dealin' Dan O'Dowd stayed put for the most part last offseason, resting on the laurels of a World Series appearance and not wanting to rock the boat when it came to our clubhouse chemistry. So to strengthen what he believed to be a weak link on our team (though it was one of our strongest points last year) he went out and got an aging right-hander whose last even decent season was 2006 with Arizona. Not only did he sign this waste of hard-earned oxygen for 2 years (oh yeah, we still have him for another one), but he also decided he wanted to pay him $7 million to do so. And what was his return? A 1-2 record with a 5.28 ERA. This human pinata was sent by Skip Hurdle to the mound in the last inning of our last game of the year in a tied contest and what did he do? Load the bases on two walks and a hit then walked in the winning run that ended our season. Can't wait for more of the same next year!

3) The rotation? More like the blow-tation (Dane Cook could've written that)
- Aaron Cook's first half combined with Ubaldo Jimenez' second half gave our 5 starters on this season a grand total of 1 decent year. Cook and Ubaldo were the only two starters whose ERAs ended up under 4.00 on the season though Cook tried his damnedest to get up there in the last two months of the year. Our rotation started out 2008 thusly:

Jeff Francis
Aaron Cook
Ubaldo Jimenez
Jason Hirsh/Mark Redman
Franklin Morales

Well, Francis was completely and totally ineffective for nearly the entire season. He started the season throwing far across his body which led to his inability to throw his fastball on the inner half of the plate, leaving his changeup down and away to right handers a very hittable pitch. This mechanical flaw most likely directly led to his shoulder problems which cropped up early on in the year, but he only told anybody in June when his record stood at a ghastly 3-7. Considering he hadn't won less than 14 games in any of his previous 3 seasons in the big leagues, I'm almost certain this was just an aberration and he'll bounce back. He'd won 45 games in three seasons. You don't do that by accident (see Lee, Cliff.)

Cook and Ubaldo had decent seasons. Ubaldo turned his potential into production and though he finished only .500 (12-12), considering he started out 1-7, that's pretty damn good.

Hirsh was supposed to be our 4th starter but was hurt in spring training and didn't make his season debut until September 3rd. In the Springs he and Franklin Morales had a contest to see who could lose their potential in the organization the fastest and to be honest, it was really hard to see who won......or lost.
Hirsh: 4-4, 5.80 ERA, 51/52 K/BB ratio.
Morales: 10-5, 5.47 ERA, 83/82 K/BB ratio.

Redman would've been better used as a hat rack.

4) Hitting with runners in scoring position
-Long thought of as a completely subjective statistic (meaning can someone really be "clutch" or not), clutch hitting was a severely sore subject for Rockies' hitters this year. After hitting .276 last year with RISP (and having the best offense in the NL), they fell to a paltry .256 this season scoring a franchise low number of runs (747.) One of our starters who fell victim to a confounding season in this category was Garrett Atkins. One of the best hitters in the National League in general the last few years, much less with runners in scoring position, his average this season plummeted 82 points with runners on base from .307 to .225......and he still led the team in RBIs with 99. That number is more of a testament to our failures at the plate rather than Atkins' prowess with the bat this season. All in all, we started off the year in a pitiful state with runners on base and finished in about the same position. Hell, we didn't even have a sacrifice fly until the last week in April. If we don't improve in this area, we can look forward to more of the same next season.

5) Lack of roster movement in the offseason
Yeah, this may be like number 2 in this list, but come on. It was more like blind faith that guys like Mark Redman (who had a few good starts down the stretch in 2007), Franklin Morales (who, at 21, was a key cog in the rotation and bullpen in September), Willy Taveras (who somehow hit .320 last season......who knows how that happened), Tulo (a rookie who had experienced nothing but success from the time he was 2 years old), and Torrealba (who didn't suck....mostly), would continue their individual success in 2008. That's a lot to ask of a few career backups, an unproven rookie, and a guy in his second season in the big leagues. Instead of scouring the free agent market for a top of the line (or even middle of the road) starter, Dealin Dan went all out for Josh Towers, Mark Redman, and Kip Wells....the Three Musketeers worthy of a song by Bryan Adams. Here's hoping that Dealin Dan will be more dealin' than Dan this winter.

6) Shhhhhhhhhh
- Yes, I said 5, but I had to say something about this. We were 3-16 against the Diamondbacks. 3-16!!!!! All I have to say about that is.........for real? I mean, seriously, bro?

Stay tuned for the top 5 things that actually went right this season......trust me, it'll be hard to find 5, but I'll do it for Todd Helton goddammit.