Rockies see light in 2025, but will strikeouts, poor pitching block vision?
Kyle Freeland says he's seen the light.
"I know that last year I did have that quote where I said that it seemed like the light was very far away," the veteran lefty said. "And I know we had another 100-loss season, but I'm very optimistic."
Wait, what?
"I like the moves (general manager) Bill Schmidt has made," Freeland continued. "I like our young players, I like the talent and the attitude. I'm excited about what's next."
He's not alone.
Outfielder Charlies Blackmon, who retired after a 14-year career, projects shortstop Ezequiel Tovar and center fielder Brenton Doyle as perennial All-Stars, sees promise in a young, rebuilt bullpen, and expects big things from future starting pitching.
"Next year, if we are talking about some other guys taking a big step forward, then I think we are in a very good place," Blackmon said, noting especially the progress of first baseman Michael Toglia.
Optimism is great, but it requires perspective when it comes to the Rockies. Perspective such as what's happened the last two seasons — the worst in franchise history.
On Aug. 2, 2023, the Rockies were flattened, losing 11-1 to the Padres at Coors Field. The Rockies managed just four hits, struck out 15 times, and went 0 for 11 with runners in scoring position. Colorado pitchers served up five home runs, three by Freeland.
The game was a snapshot of everything that went wrong during the Rockies' 103-loss season, prompting Freeland's dark quote.
"It's very frustrating," said the Denver native, who signed a five-year, $64.5 million contract extension in April of 2022. "The second year into this contract, it's definitely not how I pictured things going, for myself or this team. It's tough.
"We all want to win, and we all want to have success, and we all want to be in the playoffs playing meaningful baseball. Right now, it seems like every time you look down that tunnel, looking for that light, it just keeps getting further and further away."
A year later, based on their 61-101 record, the Rockies made only infinitesimal progress.
Their defense, with Doyle in center, Tovar at shortstop, McMahon at third, and Toglia at first, was mostly terrific.
However, the team's biggest flaws — a high strikeout rate/tepid offense, inconsistent starting pitching, and a shoddy late-inning bullpen — were the chief culprits in 2024, just as they were in '23.
Schmidt is keenly aware of all of that, but he's hopeful that Colorado is on the right track. Not that he's promising a Kansas City Royals-style revival. The Royals lost 106 games last year and are now in the America League Division Series vs. the mighty Yankees.
"Our talent base is getting better, our depth is getting better," Schmidt said. "Some of the young kids we have been building and grooming. We'll see what's going to happen.
"I'm not going to predict, 'Hey, we won (60-something) games this year and we are going to win 95 next year.' But we are going to be a better club. Our records (in 2023 and '24) might be similar, but we are a better club than we were last year. But early in the year, we blew a lot of games."
Bullpen blues
They sure did. The Rockies' struggles in the ninth inning were brutal.
Colorado entered the ninth inning with a big lead seven times only to allow five or more runs and lose. That's the most such losses in baseball's Modern Era. On Aug. 27, they held a 7.44 ERA in the ninth inning, the highest for any major league team over the last 50 years (excluding the pandemic-shortened 2020 season). Things got better, but they finished with a ninth-inning ERA of 7.10, which was the worst in the majors, by a lot. Toronto was next worst with a 5.88 ERA.
Manager Bud Black started testing young arms in the last six weeks of the season and liked what he saw. During an excellent 12-game stretch in early September, Rockies relievers posted a 2.16 ERA with no home runs allowed.
"Those are good signs, what we're seeing out of the bullpen," Black said. "It bodes well for the future. All these guys that have come up are doing a nice job keeping the ball down, changing speeds, and using their secondary pitches, along with velocity. So it's promising."
Black's optimism stems from the emergence of right-handers Angel Chivilli, Seth Halvorsen, Victor Vodnik, Jeff Criswell and Jaden Hill, and lefty Luis Peralta.
Vodnik, Halvorsen and Hill have all hit 100 mph with their fastball, and all of Colorado's young relievers regularly throw 95 mph.
"The young guys are taking everything head-on," Freeland said. "They aren't scared to go inside at the big-league level. It's great to see that fearlessness in them."
Schmidt, however, knows that young relievers can be mercurial, so he'll be looking to add some tested arms during the offseason.
"It's a long season and a lot can happen," he said. "For five or six weeks, the (young relievers) have shown well, but I still think we need a veteran presence."
Rotation in motion
There are six veterans lined up to compete for next year's starting rotation: right-handers German Marquez, Antonio Senzatela, Cal Quantrill and Ryan Feltner, and left-handers Austin Gomber and Freeland. But come spring training, the starting core could look much different.
Marquez, Quantrill and Gomber are all entering the final years of their contract, and the Rockies will almost certainly look at dealing Quantrill or Gomber during the offseason.
All of Colorado's starters ran hot and cold in 2024, hence the 5.54 ERA that was the highest in the majors and the ninth-highest in franchise history.
"The consistency of pitching has to be there," Black said. "You look at all teams that are successful, they have consistent pitching from Game 1 to Game 162. And our pitching was not that, especially early in the year. It was too variable."
Of the aforementioned pitchers, Feltner is the most promising. He finished with a 2.98 ERA over his last 15 starts, the first Rockies starter with a sub-3.00 ERA over 15 starts since Marquez during his 2021 All-Star season. His 13 quality starts this season were the most on the team and he put up a 1.78 ERA in his five September starts.
"I definitely finished better than how I started," Feltner said after the season finale against the Dodgers. "That's something you always want to do and I can definitely say I got better this year."
The Rockies have several young starters who could debut in '25. In the case of right-hander Chase Dollander, that could happen before the All-Star break.
Many baseball pundits believe Dollander, 22, the ninth overall pick in the 2023 draft, has a chance to be the best pitcher in Rockies history. The University of Tennessee product has an elite fastball and a biting slider and is developing a solid curveball and changeup. He's dominated at High-A Spokane and Double-A Hartford this season, going 6-1 with a 2.38 ERA, 166 strikeouts and 43 walks over 22 starts.
Other young pitchers to watch include lefties Carson Palmquist, 23, and Sean Sullivan, 22, and right-hander Gabriel Hughes, 23.
"What I like is that we have some starting pitching depth after all of the injuries we've had," Schmidt said. "We feel good about that and we like the young talent. Their performance will tell us when they're ready."
The K problem
Schmidt is past ready for the Rockies' offense to start producing. The team pulled off an ugly trifecta in 2014: Colorado's .242 batting average, .704 OPS and 1,617 strikeouts were all the worst in franchise history.
The strikeouts were maddening and Schmidt and Black both see it as the root of the Rockies' offensive woes.
"We just have a group of guys now (where strikeouts) are more accepted," Schmidt said. "But I don't accept it. Our coaches don't accept it. Our guys just have to do a better job of putting the ball in play going forward."
Added Black: "We've talked about it ad nauseam. We need to make better contact. Maybe the roster changes. Maybe. But if a lot of the guys come back, they have to cut the strikeouts down."
That's for sure. Colorado tied Seattle for the highest strikeout rate in baseball (26.8%). Even Tovar, who was the Rockies' best player with a team-high 26 homers and 45 doubles, was a strikeout machine. His 200 strikeouts set a franchise record, surpassing McMahon's 198 in 2023.
How bad did it get? The Rockies struck out 10 or more times in 88 games, setting a major league record. Over five games in September, the Rockies struck out 75 times. That was the second-most strikeouts by a team over a five-game span in the modern era, trailing only the Brewers' 77 Ks in 2017.
Some of that can be attributed to young players such as Jordan Beck, Hunter Goodman and Aaron Schunk getting their baptism of fire against big-league pitchers.
"Our guys are going to have to make some adjustments," Schmidt said. "We have talked about it. And if the guys don't do it, some other guys are going to get the opportunity."
Freeland, a key piece of Colorado's playoff teams in 2017-18, is not counting on a miracle next season. But he's confident there will be improvement.
"We don't expect immediate change," he said. "We aren't a large-market team where we can just go out and just purchase guys and not really worry about it. But we have talent coming up, I'm convinced of that.
"But being young at the big-league level comes with adjustments and learning curves. These young guys will go through those growing pains, whether it's right now or whether it's next year. It's about how quickly you can transition to the big leagues. As it's always said, time will tell."
