Rox Recap 4/24/08 (It's Been Awhile...)

The Rockies bullpen loves to make history. Last year closer Brian Fuentes became the first reliever in the modern era to blow four consecutive save opportunities, taking the losses in each of the four games. With their embarrassing ‘splosion this week blowing four straight games in which the Rox held leads in the 8^th inning or later, they became only the second team in the last 100 years to accomplish that dubious honor. Forgive the Rockies if they don’t make a DVD of those highlights. What would they call it? 21 Days Later?

1) The club will look a bit different at least for the next few weeks. Manny Corpas is out as closer after blowing 3 straight save opportunities and only going 4 of 8 on the year. His 7.50 ERA wasn’t helping his case either. Brian Fuentes is back. Staind never sounded so beautiful…as if that was even possible. T Rex looked hella good in his first opportunity against the Cubbies, taking the heart of their order down 1-2-3 with 2 k’s including a knee-buckling 3 pitch, 3 slider strikeout of the hottest Japanese sensation since the art of Japanimation, Kosuke Fukudome. (By the way, is there a man with a more obscene name in the big leagues? Fuk-u-do-me. That’s just inappropriate.) Rex is back where he always wanted to be and yesterday he looked to be pitching with a purpose. I don’t care who gets it done just as long as someone does because as I’ve said before, there is nothing more demoralizing to a team than thinking you have a game won only to lose it late. Then multiply that by 4. Since I can’t do math, I’ll leave that to you guys, but I can hypothesize that the solution isn’t awesome.

2) What more can you say about Cookie so far this year? He’s 3-1 with a 2.91 ERA and all 3 of his wins have come after Rockies losses. We’re paying him big bucks to do exactly what he’s been doing, being efficient with his pitches, pitching deep into ballgames, and throwing ground ball after ground ball. He also contributed 2 hits to help his cause as he’s been the best pitcher on the Rockies’ staff by far this season. He’s got the stuff to sustain a roll like this for a while longer with that heavy sinker and his newfound cut fastball.

3) Chris Iannetta hit his first home run of the year yesterday, a high fly ball that reached the glove of the fans in the first row, or as they’d call it in Philadelphia, an upper deck blast. More importantly though, it broke a 1 all tie and swelled the hearts of Frost Brewed Baseball contributors everywhere, ok, just Eric and me, but it was still nice to see.

The Rox head to the West Coast once again to take on the Los Angeles Dodgers (pronounced “los Los An-yay-lace Doy-ers). After his last start, Clint Hurdle took Ubaldo Jimenez aside and told him that they actually do play a full 9 innings in every Major League game as he was under the impression that anything after 6 was considered extra innings. Also, his arrogant trick of walking a bunch of guys just to prove he can get out of trouble wasn’t flying with the skipper. Starship Troopers is awesome and everyone should stop reading this and go watch it right now.

Denvah Killah B’s, They On Tha Swarm

Before this post I need to define some terms to avoid unavoidable confusion:

Sam – strong-side linebacker

Will – weak-side linebacker

Mike – middle linebacker

Nico – singer-songwriter/actress/fashion model

It seemed like only yesterday, My Chemical Romance was cool, Tip “T.I.” Harris was the king, the Broncos could play defense. But those days have gone the way of Brokeback Mountain. Disc Jockey Williams, Captain Albert Wilson and Ian “Solid” Gold were swarming the ball and making tackles. Then Captain Al piledrove himself off the field on a stretcher… And Ian Gold forgot how to stay gold, Ponyboy… And DJ got lost when he left the turntables and tried to be Like Mike, starring Lil’ Bow Wow and Allen Iverson… And Jay Cutler couldn’t rack up 10 TDs per game to give the team a fighting chance, even if he is a stoic robot with poor hair-cutting skills.

But there is a solution—a Mike Shanahan solution—the kind that only makes sense to Shanahan and then when it doesn’t work, it’s somebody else’s fault. That’s why he has more job security than Bill Belichick and Sir Alex Ferguson (America, you’ll never understand). Blamey McShanahan is like Arsene Wenger with tenure (again… America, you’ll never understand). This new solution of Sir Michael Shanahan’s: move DJ back to Sam, have Champ get Boss to play Will and re-unite the Bailey family (Do they have any other brothers? Is dad too old?). Then… for the most important linebacker, the master of defensive ceremonies rockin’ the Mike (and the play-calling radio next year), Shanny picked up a special-teamer from the Seahawks of Seattle. There you go Michael Shanablitz; get a guy who has started 2 NFL games in his career and make him your defensive quarterback. Sure he was a team captain for the Seahawks and all, but was it not indicative of his abilities when he attracted little attention from other teams in free agency? Maybe Shanahan picks guys based on their names. Niko Koutouvides is a pretty crazy name, is it not? Didn’t he do an album with the Velvet Underground? (and one)

In the end, though, it’s not how many games you’ve started, or that you don’t do too much talking these days… these days (that’s two!), it’s how you play. Maybe Niko fits into the defensive scheme—whatever Shanahan’s 95^th defensive scheme of the month is. He could actually be a decent player, though that’s about as likely as Shanahan avoiding the tanning salon for more than a week. It could happen though. Atari Bigby was an undrafted linebacker whom the Packers switched to safety after he spent a couple years on the practice squad and special teams. He turned out to be a dominant strong safety. Will Niko follow suit? Will the Chelsea Girl “End” “All Tomorrow’s Parties” on “Sunday Morning?” (and three, four, five, six and… I apologize profusely) No, Niko probably won’t when you consider the Broncos recent defensive history.

There is this super over-hyped thing—I think they call it the draught or something—that the Broncos could try and use. Their #12 pick is a pretty bad spot for linebacker and defensive tackle, where they really need help. There are, however, some decent o-lineman according Melvin “Yes, I drank 35 cups of coffee in the last five minutes and I mistook the cocaine for sugar” Kiper Jr. What say they take their o-linemen in the first round, whomever it may be? Then, in the third or fourth round they may, perchance, happen upon a little middle linebacker by the name of Jordan Dizon, who clandestinely (big word!) led the nation in solo tackles and didn’t get the Butkus Award because he didn’t play for Ohio State. He out tackled James Laurinaitis by 51 total, 81 solo and 2.5 for a loss, but alas, Laurinaitis out games-played-for-Ohio-State-ed Dizon by 13. In addition to this egregious flaw, Dizon is little, only weighing 225 (he also ran a 4.59 40 at the CU pro day!?!?). But… it just so happens that Shanny’s 4-3, cover 2 intensive, defensive scheme requires smaller, quicker linebackers. He could use a little tackling machine in the middle of that defense (and some defensive linemen not named Elvis who can play). I’m no scout, and I probably know a lot less about football than I think I do, but Dizon seems like a decent fit and the draught (yeah?) is a pretty decent talent pool compared to the 27-year-old special teamer/dead German singer-songwriter/fashion model/actress pool (and seven… biggitty biggitty boo-yah!).

I forgot about the quotes recently—not this time:

“You're some sort of big, fat, smart-bug, aren't you?” – Casper Van Dien as Johnny Rico in the 1997 smash-hit Starship Troopers

Rox Recap 4/4/08

4/4/08

Something special was in the air at Coors Field today. Yeah, it was sold out like every other Opening Day in Coors Field/Mile High Stadium history, but today was the first time any Rockies’ fan’s optimism had any kind of merit to it. Even those like me, the cautiously optimistic, had only the highest hopes for my beloved Rox this year all the way from Rockpril to Rockvember. After today however, some definite questions need to be answered if we have even the slightest chance at proving that we weren’t just a one hit wonder.

1) 1) For starters, what’s wrong with Tulo? While I understand that we’re only 4 games into the season and any questions about the upcoming 5 months are completely off base and presumptuous, his performance so far leaves many fans wondering the same. Perhaps it’s the hefty pressure he puts on himself to be the best player in the game on a daily basis which also endears him to every Rockies fan. Perhaps it’s the added weight of the 6 year, $31 million contract he signed in the offseason and the burden it puts on the player from management and the fans to continue to perform at an even higher level than he did last year. Tulo’s defense is his calling card but thus far this season, he looks more like Ryan Braun than the deserving Gold Glove winner he proved to be. In the first, a terrible bunt by Chris Burke led Yorvit Torrealba to try to gun him down at 2^nd. Yorv’s throw wasn’t great, but Tulo tried to hurry the toss to Todd to get the double play and pulled his foot off the bag before he received the ball. That failure to get at least one out let the D-Bags, excuse me, D-Backs, to prolong their big inning and set the tone for the entire game. Then he bobbled a slow grounder from his so-called nemesis Justin Upton in the fourth inning, a play he could have made last year with both hands tied behind his back….nevermind the logistics of that statement. His throws were consistently low to Todd over at first who made several scoops out of the dirt to save Tulo from even more knocks on his fielding percentage. He also struck out twice and never looked comfortable at the plate. Like I said, all of these things could just be Tulo adjusting to his life as one of the top shortstops in all of baseball. I’m confident he’ll turn it around soon, but for now, I’m a bit discouraged to say the least.

2) 2) I thought we were supposed to have one of the most potent offenses in the league this year. Could anybody please let me know where that offense has gone? Do we need to enact a legislation in the Senate? Do we need to send troops to some god-forsaken sand dune to find it? Nevermind, no sense in starting a political war on these pages. Instead of dominating the National League like we were supposed to, our offense has gone all Carmen Sandiego on us. Where in the world is it? In four games thus far, our vaunted O has mustered up a grand total of 6 runs against such stopgap starting pitchers as Todd Wellemeyer, Brad Thompson, and Kyle Lohse whose career win-loss records add up to a grand total of 87-92. Not exactly on par with the esteemed careers of Webb, Haren, and Randy Johnson. The national media’s lack of respect for the Rockies accomplishments last year was due to the unreal finish to their season that came out of nowhere. In scheduling nationally televised games this season, the Rox were only given one ESPN game even as the National League Champions. Their lackluster start to this season has proven the media critics right so far. They don’t believe the Rockies have it in them to do the same things they did last year. The hitters in this lineup are much too good to be held down for long, so look for a breakout soon. Man, I hope I’m right.

3) 3) Hidden in the offensive woes of the entire team is Todd Helton’s quality start at the dish. He’s the only starter hitting above .300 and knocked the team’s only run in today’s game over the right field wall for his first dinger of the season. His days of hitting 30+ home runs are more than likely behind him, but this is a good sign that he’s striking the ball so well this early in the season.

4) 4) Mark Redman did about as well as could be expected for someone we rescued from the Island of Misfit Starting Pitchers. 5 runs (4 earned) in 5.2 innings with our offense will at least keep us competitive in probably about 75% of the games. He’s the new Josh Fogg except without the cool hip nickname. If we sign Method Man, that would definitely expediate the nickname process.

5) 5) Holliday struck out four times today. FOUR TIMES! When was the last time that happened? I’m going to go with never. He’s hitting .071 on the season and though averages mean absolutely jackshit this early in the year, that’s not exactly the kind of production you expect from your cleanup hitter. He started out slowly last year as well so this is just a blip on his otherwise parquet-clean radar. He’s not going to pull an Atkins on us and start out by hitting under .200 for the majority of the first two months. Once again, I pray to Elway that I’m right.

Go Broncos.