Posts tagged ‘Colorado Rockies’

In episode 143, we mentioned that Troy Tulowitzki is growing out his mullet this season for charity and that now fans can get in on the action by purchasing their very own Rockies mullet cap.  In typical Rockiescast fashion though, we didn’t bother to research the details of this effort.  Thankfully, Meredith (and the Rockies website) came through with the details.  For $25, you can support the cause and reserve a mullet hat of your own.  Details and the donation form are available on the Rockies’ website at a fantastically named url: http://www.coloradorockies.com/mullet.

Reserve one today, and tell tasteful hairstyles: “You’re @#*%ing out!”

… to the organization, Kaz Matsui. Kaz agreed to a minor-league deal with the club.

… to the majors, Chris Iannetta. Chris has rediscovered his stroke, hitting .349 with 5 homers since being sent down to the Springs.

… Tulo’s power stroke - four homers in the last 5 games.

… to pitching baseballs, Huston Street. Huston threw a 20-pitch bullpen session, his first pitches since tweaking his groin in a rehab start for Tulsa.

… to the Rockies +.500 record.

… clueless local columnists making nonsensical arguments for why Todd Helton is washed up. More on (or perhaps moron) this during the next cast.

… Rockiescast references to Welcome Back, Kotter - the greatest show in the history of television.

For once I can (partially) blame someone else for stupid things I’ve said.  If you listened to Episode 139, you heard me mention that the Rockies had placed Melvin Mora on the disabled list and activated Jason Hammel — despite not planning to have him start immediately.  If you watched last night’s debacle, you might have noticed that Mora had a pinch hit appearance, which is hard to do from the DL.  Of course, it turns out that Mora was never placed on the list at all.

In all of the confusion the weather caused with the Rockies roster plans, the team’s own website seems to have diverged from reality.  Check out coloradorockies.com’s list of transactions for May 12 below.

So I’m going to pin most of the blame for this on MLB Advanced Media, which runs all of the MLB team sites.  Obviously though, I share some of the responsibility for this error, as I made the mistake of assuming that I could trust MLB for accurate info on transactions made within MLB.  At least we don’t have to worry about that Mora shortage!

The Phillies cheat, Charlie Manuel (pictured below) contradicts his own words as well as video evidence as he rattles off nonsensical counter-accusations and excuses, and MLB essentially looks the other way.  There is something very wrong with this picture.

In case you missed this stink that should be much bigger than it is, FSN Rocky Mountain’s cameras — by request of the Rockies coaches — caught Billmeyer, the Phillies’ bullpen coach, using binoculars to look toward home plate during Monday night’s game.  Among Manuel’s excuses is that Billmeyer uses binoculars only to watch his own catcher’s positioning.  The problem with that argument is the facts: the Rockies and FSN only observed Billmeyer using the binoculars during the top of the innings, when the Rockies were in the field and Miguel Olivo was catching.

Using binoculars to steal signs from the other team is explicitly against MLB rules.  So this is an open-and-shut case.  The only logical reason the Phillies would want such a magnified view of the opposing catcher is to steal signs, and the Phillies have offered no alternative explanation.  Instead, Manuel has gone through a laundry list of contradictory statements to deny and excuse his team’s cheating.  At one point, he forcefully denied the accusation, saying his team does not steal signs.  Later he said that his team would steal signs if given the opportunity, but it’s okay because so would any other team.

Manuel also tried to justify the cheating by hypothesizing that — because the Mets have a better record at home than on the road — maybe the Mets do the same thing at Citi Field.  I have to admit he’s got a point there.  Who has ever heard of a sports team that plays better at home than on the road?  There could certainly be no explanation for that other than cheating.  And of course Manuel brought up the infamous incident in the 2007 NLDS when the Phillies convinced themselves that Manuel Corpas was putting a foreign substance on the ball before he pitched it.  What he neglected to mention was how MLB reviewed the incident and found no reason to conclude that Corpas was cheating.

That gets us to the heart of what is so unnerving about this situation.  When the Rockies were accused of cheating based on inconclusive video footage, MLB didn’t hesitate to review the incident.  When the Phillies were caught cheating on videotape, MLB issued them a verbal warning.  It’s not as if this can be regarded as a one time incident that occurred during a couple early innings of one regular season game.  After stealing signs early on in this contest, the Phillies mounted a huge rally at the end of the game to win it.  If you haven’t repressed the memories, you might recall that the Phillies won both of their 2009 NLDS games at Coors Field in an eerily similar fashion.  Make of that what you will, but it certainly calls into question whether there was illegal sign stealing going on there too.  On top of that, the Phillies were previously accused of using a video camera to steal signs, and MLB did nothing.

It’s inexcusable that MLB would ignore repeated and brazen rules violations for certain teams.  When the media ignores 75% of the Big Leagues to shower attention on its darling East Coast teams, it’s obnoxious.  When MLB ignores the rules to allow one of its media darlings to cheat, it threatens the integrity of the entire game.  I had hoped that the powers that be in baseball would have learned from the steroid scandal not to look the other way for the sake of short term gains, but unfortunately that does not appear to be the case.

We’re sorry we  couldn’t get this up sooner, but better late than never.  Awesome job Eric, Dave, Burke, and Clay. We declare you the National League Lego Champions of 2007!

The Rockies learned this morning that they lost their president.  Keli McGregor was found dead in a Salt Lake City hotel room at around 9a.m. today, according to the Denver Post.

Rockiescast would like to extend its sincere condolences to Mr. McGregor’s family and the entire Rockies organization.

In our latest episode, in addition to our look ahead to the Nats series we discussed some creative fan support for the Nats in the form of the Nat Rider, a Washington Nationals decorated bicycle that a Nats Fan (one from a group of guys) will ride from a local DC bar to Nationals Park before the game.  If you would like to support some creative fans, have a love of all things remotely Hasselhoff related, or just have sympathy for some poor Nationals fans, go to the Nat Rider Facebook page and become a fan.

In honor of Ubaldo’s awesome no-hitter on Saturday, here are a few no-hitter historical facts:
- In addition to Ubaldo, 15 other pitchers have thrown no-hitters while allowing six or more walks. The record is ten walks in a ten-inning no-hitter thrown by Jim Maloney in 1965, resulting in a win for his Reds against the Cubs.
- Nolan Ryan holds the record with seven no-hitters. His first came in 1973. His final no-hitter came on May 1st, 1991 at the age of 44. That same day, Rickey Henderson broke Lou Brock’s career stolen base record and Rickey officially declared himself the greatest of all time.
- In my opinion, the most impressive no-hitter was thrown in 1991 when Jim Abbott achieved the feat despite being born without a right hand.
- On August 6, 1969, Ken Holtzman tossed a no-hitter for the Cubs without recording a single strikeout.
- In 1969, Bill Stoneman made his 5th career start. It was the Montreal Expos 9th game as a franchise. The Phillies could not hit him.
- Stoneman is one of the pitchers to walk more batters than Ubaldo during a no-hitter, walking seven in a 7-0 victory and no-hitter against the Mets. With the game played in Montreal, it was the first MLB no-hitter thrown outside of the United States.

On Sunday, friend of the show SNY.tv senior editor Ted Berg joined Scott and I to give us a preview of the Rockies series against the Mets. You can find that conversation in Episode 131. Today, it was our turn to return the favor. Scott and I gave some insight on the Rockies to SNY.tv’s The Baseball Show. Check it out:

And while we’re talking about Ted Berg, be sure to check out his blog at Tedquarters.net. Once I got over my jealous rage at his awesome domain name, I realized that this is a good site for anyone who can stand to listen to Scott and I ramble on about tacos and beards. This Berg character knows the score.

The 2010 Rockies TV commercials are out!  It feels like Opening Day came early this year!  Okay, it’s not nearly that exciting, but it’s still the Rockies in uniform doing stuff.  After months sans baseball, that’s enough to get me bouncing off the walls like an 8-year-old on a sugar high.  Please have a look and tell us your impressions in the comments section.  Maybe my opinion will change once the giddiness wears off, but I am impressed with these ads (most of them, anyway).  They definitely have a different feel than previous seasons’ Rockies ads.  I think this year’s batch contains more situational, dialogue-based humor and fewer sight gags than previous ads.

Let me be clear though, I have no problem with sight gags.  My favorite of the 2009 Rockies ads is below.  Just look at the size of Aaron Cook’s hat!  It’s funny, because it’s bigger than a…you know…a normal hat.

With the start of a new year, this seems like an appropriate time to take a look at what the future holds for the Rockies.

Starting with the immediate future, the Rockies will begin the 2010 season with a new voice in the radio broadcast booth. Jeff Kingery’s departure generated quite a bit of buzz and speculation last fall as to who would be given the task of filling his big original-broadcaster shoes. This week, the new guy was revealed to be longtime Nuggets broadcaster Jerry Schemmel. Needless to say, Rockiescast is very curious as to how this new broadcast team of Schemmel and Jack Corrigan will sound. I’m hopeful that Schemmel will be a solid replacement for Kingery. Kingery’s firsthand knowledge of every moment in Rockies history is gone, but Schemmel will bring his own skill set. A huge part of baseball radio broadcast is finding interesting topics to discuss during lulls in the action on the field, and it appears that Jerry Schemmel has plenty of interesting things to talk about.

The new year is also a good excuse to look at what the Rockies have cooking in the organization for the long term.  I freely admit that I’m terrible at getting good, in-depth info on prospects. Luckily, we recently got a hot tip via e-mail about a blog committed to the art of scouting baseball prospects: Diamond Futures. This week, they did their analysis of the prospects in the Rockies’ system.  Take a look: it’s some pretty interesting stuff. My only complaint is that Diamond Futures failed to rank organizations by the most important criteria: awesome prospect names. Al Alburquerque, Jhoulys Chacin, Rex Brothers, Delta Cleary…how can another organization possibly compete with names like that?!