A question about Jorge de la Rosa

Basically, compared to his time in the majors with KC, JDLR’s Ks have gone up, walks have gone down, groundball rate has gone up, and his home runs have gone down. Other people may have a more detailed explanation of how often he uses his pitches or how he throws something different now, but the above resulting changes are the surface layer evidence of him being a better pitcher. You can also explore his Fangraphs profile for explanations about his pitch frequency, velocity, and effectiveness of each pitch.

Don’t let anyone tell you that the improvements mean the Rockies should pay more than 3yr/36m for him though.

He has switched from his breaking pitch of choice as a curveball to a slider with Colorado, which he has added velocity under Apodaca. He has also increased velocity on his fastball. DLR uses his change-up far more than he ever did before arriving in Colorado. Part of that is due to being ahead in the count more, but he’s been more willing to work backwards at times, and he has been able to induce swings at pitches out of the zone more frequently with that multi-pronged approach. He throws more strikes than he ever has before.

There could be any number of explanations for how the above improvements came to fruition. The most obvious is defeating his mental demons. de la Rosa struggled with confidence and was easily flustered on the mound when he arrived in Colorado, so the staff assigned him a sports psychologist. There isn’t a tangible direct line between the psychologist and his ERA per se, though his demeanor on the mound certainly seemed to improve.

I think Bob Apodaca has a lot to do with this. He’s almost to the point where he’s becoming Dave Duncan-esque in terms of turning around pitchers’ careers. I mean, look at guys like DLR, Jason Marquis, Rodrigo Lopez in the short time he was here, and many others…Dac deserves some credit here. That is why I’m not exactly thrilled – but can live with – the Rockies constantly raiding the scrap heap for guys that Apodaca feels he can work with.