@MarkKnudson41
In a way, Major League Baseball’s annual Winter Meetings were successful for the Colorado Rockies. Consider this: Aaron Judge didn’t sign with the San Francisco Giants or San Diego Padres, and the Los Angeles Dodgers lost star shortstop Trey Turner to the Phillies and weren’t able to sign star pitcher Justin Verlander. None of their NL West rivals got better during the big trading period…so there’s that.
Meanwhile, the Rockies themselves did exactly what most expected them to do: Nothing. They stood pat.
That doesn’t mean they didn’t make an effort to land a centerfielder and another pitcher. All reports from San Diego are that they were trying…in their way. It was a disappointment to lose out on free agent centerfielder Cody Bellinger, who opted for a one-year deal with the Chicago Cubs to try to get his game back to MVP level and secure a new lucrative long term deal a year from now. Had the Rockies been able to land Bellinger, he would have been the second former MVP in their outfield, along with Kris Bryant…assuming the former Cub gets healthy at some point.
Alas, the Rockies are left still needing a centerfielder – preferably one that hits from the left side – and at the very least a late inning bullpen arm. Trading and free agent signing season is still wide open, and players like Brandon Nimmo and Andrew Benintendi remain available…so there’s that.
But what all this signals is that the Rockies remain committed to growing their own.
This will be a season for the kids. The young players like Ezequiel Tovar and Michael Toglia will get the chance to prove themselves worthy of a long term roster spot.
Here’s where misconceptions come in. Casual fans see a lack of free agent signings and instantly fall back on the tired “the Monfort’s are cheap” excuse, without really looking at the situation.
Let’s remember that before the pandemic wrecked season and his own efforts to get out of town, Nolan Arenado was given a huge contract by the Colorado Rockies. That’s not being “cheap.”
The Rockies organization has chosen to operate differently from most other organizations. The business model has been widely successful – everywhere but on the scoreboard. In what other industry can you put out a mediocre product and still make a ton of money?
But their approach to roster building – while obviously being strongly impacted by monetary constraints – has not been completely dictated by the payroll. They’ve spent big money in the past in order to try to build a consistent winner. They’ve just spent it poorly. Sometimes very poorly.
Ian Desmond, Daniel Murphy, Wade Davis, Jake McGee, Bryan Shaw. Big money free agent signings. All busts for the most part.
That’s not being cheap. That’s just making poor decisions.
So now with General Manager Bill Schmidt at the helm, the Rockies are being far more careful. You can argue that the Bryant signing falls into the same category as the one’s mentioned above, and you might be right. But there’s still a lot of years left on that contract. We’ll find out if Bryant becomes another free agent failure or not. But they aren’t throwing huge money at pitchers in the later stages of their careers. They aren’t signing aging sluggers to phat contracts to try to sell a few extra tickets.
Without coming out and saying it (like they did in the early 2000’s with the “Generation R” campaign) the Rockies are committed to a rebuild.
That won’t mean they’re much of a contender in 2023, but it does mean there is reason to have hope for the years after that.