The Rockies need to go the Blake Street Bombers route in 2020
Jul 2, 2020, 6:30 AM
It’s simple, just score as many runs as possible! That’s what the Rockies have always been good at, so why not go all in on it this season?
The 2020 MLB season didn’t go as planned. Instead of the normal 162-game season, we are getting handed a shortened 60-game season. It’s better than nothing, right?
Rockies starting pitcher Kyle Freeland came out recently and said it’s going to be a race in those 60 games. If that’s the case, the Rockies need to take advantage of what they have. That’s offense!
In the last three seasons after 60 games, Colorado has been above .500 each time. They would then get the typical “June Swoon” and fall apart midway through the season.
Last season, the Rockies led the National League in batting average that ranked fifth in all of baseball, 15th in home runs, and ninth in total runs (fourth in the NL). Meanwhile, their pitching wasn’t so hot. The Rockies finished with a 5.56 ERA; that was second to last in all of baseball. Not to mention that their bullpen had the third-worst ERA in the MLB, as well.
So it’s time to give up on the pitching because that will never improve. Let’s just hope the Rockies can outscore everyone, especially at Coors Field.
It’s plain and simple, Rockies general manager Jeff Bridich, who thinks he knows everything about baseball because he went to Harvard, didn’t improve the team hardly at all this offseason. Especially with pitching. The only improvement he made was signing outfielder Matt Kemp to a minor league deal for this season.
Now, Kemp loves to hit at 20th and Blake. In 86 games at Coors Field in his career, Kemp has a batting average of .327, with 21 home runs and 77 RBIs. It’s safe to say Kemp was a solid addition to this roster.
In fact, I’ll go a step further and say that the Rockies should go out and add another powerful bat to the lineup – Yasiel Puig. The powerful hitter has a career batting average of .305 at Coors Field, as well. Now, I’m not saying Bud Black should put Puig in the outfield every day, but it would make sense to add him to the lineup as the designated hitter.
With the DH rule getting adopted by the National League this season, it actually benefits the Rockies by adding another bat to the lineup instead of the pitcher hitting and becoming a guaranteed out. There were plenty of times last season where the Rockies would have the eight and nine hitters come up in an inning and not be able to get on base for leadoff star Charlie Blackmon bring in any runs. Now with the DH, that changes things.
The bottom line is that the pitching depth on the Rockies roster isn’t deep enough in the rotation or the bullpen to compete with the elite teams in close games. But if the offense is better than the opposing teams, just go out there and try to outscore everyone with the advantage of playing at Coors Field.
The Rockies will take on five teams that finished under .500 last season and don’t score runs. It’s time for the Rockies to take advantage of where they play and add power and more offense to this lineup so that they can light up that scoreboard in 2020 to make a legit playoff run based off their offense.
