In March, Sports Illustrated recently surveyed fans across the nation with regard to the experience at their local ball-park. They asked them to rate the stadium based on the following factors: affordability, food, team quality, tradition, atmosphere, fan IQ, hospitality, promotions, traffic and neighborhood, then used those to come up with an overall ranking.  (note: I stole this opening paragraph from Jim McLennan at the Snake pit on their reporting of this ranking. I'm tired and lazy)

Wonder where Coors Field ranked?  How about #7! You can see the detailed results by clicking on the logo of each team. The Rockies scores are HERE

Lets look at the categories, and I'll throw in my 2 cents:

1. Affordability: 6th.  We do have relatively cheap tickets. Compare a Rockies game to any other major league sporting event, or even a movie, it's a bargain.
2. Food: 9th  ummmmm I'm not sure about this one.  But since a lot of people like the ball park food and go to the game for this reason I can see it.  Coors has a nice variety around the park.
3. Team Quality: 6th  Hey Fans, we just won the National League....6th? (see # 6)
   
4. History and Tradition: 22  Our fans are being kind
5. Ball Park Atmosphere: 12th   Well we have less air.  But there is nothing better then watching the sun go down behind the mountains on a cool summer evening. 
6. Fan Intelligence: 24th  Yeah, the average fan knows crap about baseball.  It's embarrassing at times.  We are starting to boo Hurdle and some of his stupid moves, but last year, I was asked if Jimenez was still the closer.  (No not Uballo).  I don't think the average fan couldn't name a Rockie besides, Tulo or Helton.  A Cards fan will gripe about a certain pitch 2 games ago and be able to back up why a certain pitcher shouldn't have thrown that certain pitch to a certain batter at that time.
   
7. Fan Hospitality: 9th  We are really too damn nice to the Cub fans.
8. Promotions: 21st.  Ladies night, free hot dog night, T-Shirt nights, I think the Rockies do ok with this.  But it's not the reason people go to the games, which is why the fans don't give it much credit.
   
9. Getting to the Game: 2nd !  We really do have it nice.  A downtown park, and a great light rail system, and bus shuttle services.  That's a rare combination. We even have some parking, if you know where to look.
10. Neighborhood: 3rd  Which is great considering we are behind Gas Lamp and Wrigleyville. 
    

Dear Rockies fans,

I know it’s been a very, very tough road so far this season. We all expected amazing things out of our defending National League Champions. And yet, here we are, back where we were last May: 9 games under .500 and in last place in the NL West.

No time to fret though. We’ve been here before and still turned it around and made it to the World Series. So, in hopes of talking all the Rockies fans off the ledge, away from the “fluke” talk, I’ve made today “Keep the Faith Day” on my Rockies blog.

Click here for 5 reasons you gotta keep the faith!

Continue reading this post »

I thought I would take sometime too look at some players who have been struggling, and see if I can find a reason to why they are having such a hard time.   I will start with Corpas.

Last year Corpas was amazing for us down the strech and finish the season with a 2.08 ERA, 19 saves, 58 Strikeouts to 20 BB's.  He was easily on his way to becoming one of the leagues top young relief pitchers.  However going into this year he has imploded, blowing 4 saves, and eventually loosing his closer role to Fuentes, while not look like the same pitcher on the mound that we saw last year.

Lets take a closer look shall we.  Here are Corpas's BB/9, K/9, WHIP, and Batting Average for Balls in play for 2007:

2.31/6.69/1.06/.260

In 2008 his line looks like this:

6.32/3.45/1.98/.320

As you can see his Walk rates have more then doubled, while his strike out rates has declined.  Also he has been rather unlucky with ball in play going from .260 to .320.  A .320 BABIP is a little higher then his career normal of .290 so that should normalize in time.  The greater concern has been his walks and strikeout rates.  It seems to me that he is scared to attack the hitters this year, and is pitching around them more.  This is supported by the fact that he is only throwing strikes 55% of the time as opposed to last year when he was throwing strikes 64% of the time. 

My guess is that he's been a bit shaken up this year, as batters have been a bit more luck against him.  I think that once he starts to attack hitters like he did last year he will be fine, right now though he needs to clear his head though.  If there is any good news its that his Linedrive, flyball and groundball percentages are within 2% of what they were last year. 

I think it might be interesting if we had him start a game or two, give him a few innings to work on his command a little bit and have him re-trust his stuff.  Maybe then we can get our old Manny Corpas back.

I love it how things have a way of just working out.  As a part of getting my visa approved to work in Korea, I had to make a trip out to San Francisco Wednesday morning.  It occurred to me late Tuesday night that the Rockies were there too, so my last Rockies game ended up being at AT&T Park. 

Ended up the same way as the last game I went to at Coors (stupid bullpen), but I've got a ton of pictures, so let's get to 'em...

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How's that Bullpen treating you there?

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They've got a pretty awesome statue of Willie McCovey overlooking the cove out there.  I'll give them this, the view from this stadium are slightly alright.  K, they're fantastic.

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Yeah, those aren't too bad.  Here's the inside views:

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That last one is the view from my seat.  I picked out a spot right in front the Rockies Bullpen there.  Made for some decent shots during warmups...

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Little known fact about Todd... he warms up by doing Irish jigs.  I didn't know that until I snapped the picture.

Unfortunately, I was completely out of it by this point.  I was running on about a hour of sleep... so I ended up not taking a lot of pictures during the game.  I snapped out of it just long enough to get a quick snapshot of Herrera's first AB:

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They've got one hell of a scoreboard out there.  That thing has got to be one of the clearest things I've ever seen.

As for the game, same problems as usual.  We just could not get a hit with a runner in scoring position.  The Giants did have a great play by Lewis in left to keep the lead, but the biggest play of the game was a very small one.

Bottom of the 6th, U-Ball walks Lewis to start off the inning.  He then quickly gets a chopper to 2nd, Herrera then charges the ball needlessly... catching the ball off balance with his momentum taking him out of the basepath.  He reaches back to try and tag Lewis, misses and throws to 1st to get Velez.  A small play, but not when Winn softly lines a pitch into center to score Lewis.

I'll tell you, a major league 2nd baseman waits on that ball another split second, quickly flips that to Barmes and at least gets the lead runner, maybe gets a double play.  Instead, the Giants tie the game, U-Ball gets pulled, Speier hangs a slider, and I'm left with this sign to cheer me up afterwards:

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I almost had to give that guy a dollar just for standing outside the stadium with that sign.

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4-5, 94 1/3 IP, 82 H, 61 R, 50 ER, 49 BB, 82 K, 10 HRA, 4.77 ERA, 1.39 WHIP

1-1, 17 2/3 IP, 17 H, 8 R, 8 ER, 10 BB, 9 K, 2 HRA, 4.07 ERA, 1.53 WHIP

Those two lines are both for the same pitcher, Ubaldo Jimenez. The first line is his numbers in games caught by Yorvit Torrealba, the second line is his numbers in games caught by Chris Iannetta. We are constantly being told by "the powers that be" that Torrealba is in there because of his excellent mentoring of our Latin pitchers.

With Ubaldo at least, there seems to be no big difference between his performance with Torrealba and Iannetta behind the plate. His walk and strikeout numbers are a little better with Torrealba, but his ERA is nearly a full run lower with Iannetta behind the dish. So, it doesn't seem to matter to Ubaldo who his catcher is. Franklin Morales, however, is a different story.

With Torrealba: 2-3, 41 1/3 IP, 37 H, 16 R, 16 ER, 23 BB, 22 K, 1 HRA, 3.48 ERA, 1.45 WHIP

With Iannetta: 2-1, 18 IP, 20 H, 16 R, 16 ER, 8 BB, 9 K, 2 HRA, 8.00 ERA, 1.56 WHIP

Morales, unlike Ubaldo, seems to actually benefit from having Torrealba catch him. His ERA more than doubles with Iannetta behind the plate. But Frankie's in the minors now, so if you look at the numbers the club currently has no excuse for keeping Iannetta on the bench. If/when Franklin comes back, though, get Yorvit behind the plate when Morales is on the mound. 

I have always considered Cook one of my favorite Rockies, but maybe that is because he is a fellow ginger.  I know that one day he will be controlling the world with Ron Howard, Simon Pegg and myself.  That is why I have always had a soft spot for him and his sinkerball.

Anyway, I have started to notice a trend with our (so far) only good pitcher, and I decided to do some number crunching to see if I had a valid point.  The trend being that Cook seems to have most of the damage done to him in the first couple of innings, and then he buckles down and cruises for the rest of the game.  While the numbers I came up with weren't as drastically different as I thought the might be, they still do somewhat validate my point. 

First two innings- 3.00 ERA, 1.583 WHIP, 3.00 K/9

Rest of game- 2.17 ERA, 0.965 WHIP, 4.97 K/9

It is worth ponting out that all three of Cook's unearned runs came within the first two innings as well. 

And no, I have nothing to do better on a Wedensday night that sit around and crunch numbers while I drink Tom Collinses.  (Is that the correct plural for a Tom Collins?) 

Rockies All Access for Thurs., May 1 at 7:00 p.m. MT

Replays scheduled for Thurs., May 1 at 10:00 p.m., Fri., May 2 at 2:00 p.m. and 11:30 p.m., Sat., May 3 at 10:00 a.m. and 4:30 p.m. and Sun., May 4 at 10:00 a.m. and 1:30 p.m.

This week on TOYOTA ROCKIES ALL ACCESS, hosts Oren Lomena and Alanna Rizzo make their way to San Francisco where the Rockies are taking on the Giants.

While there, the duo check out the Marin Headlands, take a trolley ride around the city, hang around Fisherman’s Wharf and wander Union Square.

With representatives of former San Francisco Giants star Barry Bonds claiming there is a period of owner collusion in baseball keeping teams from signing Bonds, Lomena plays a game called “Collusion or Kahlua.”  Lomena asks Giants fans whether they believe in the collusion statement or if Bonds’ reps are drinking too much Kahlua.  Surprisingly, many fans go with the Kahlua answer.

Rockies outfielder Ryan Spilborghs attempts to have a nice, peaceful conversation with catcher Yorvit Torrealba while getting a tour of the city; however, the conversation quickly turns into Torrealba making fun of the way Spilborghs dresses.  As a result, Torrealba takes Spilborghs and pitcher Josh Newman to Nordstrom’s to buy new suits. 

ROCKIES ALL ACCESS also takes a look back at the past year of Rockies shortstop Troy Tulowitzki – from fighting to make the lineup at the beginning of 2007 to his recent injury. 

Hey guys, I'm not a Rockies fan, but I thought you would be interested in this piece on Dexter Fowler.  The article allows you to get a feel for the mechanics of his swing from both sides of the plate.

Already a great defensive player, and already possessing great plate discipline, his power was really the only question mark and that seems to have been answered this year.  I am still trying to find video on him from this year because his swing from last year (especially from the right side) were not conducive to hitting for power.  

Dexter Fowler vs. Tyler Colvin

You guys should be excited about the prospects of him patrolling center field for years to come.

Also, I'm sure you guys are aware Franklin Morales was sent down to AAA tonight.  Tomorrow I am publishing an article on his struggles and I'll say this:

His loss of velocity is solely mechanics based and his loss of control is based on overthinking his new mechanics that are supposed to improve his control.  I hope that makes sense.

I have video of him from last year and this year and the differences are clear in my opinion.

Squeaky is one of those constantly happy, annoyingly optimistic sort of people. Put with an early bedtime and lots of sleep, I've decided the only way to deal with this schneid is to make fun of it. Everyone: Fans, Coaches, players, etc is taking this very seriously/sullenly. Not saying they shouldn't, just saying that's what I see. So my brilliant idea was to lighten it up a bit.

I woke up with the song "Heart" from Damn Yankees stuck in my head. Go figure. I think we need all our heart back...

Anywho. Here are my ideas for some improvement. Not really sure how any of them is supposed to work. At the very least it would make the games incredibly amusing to watch.

1. Pull up all the socks and turn hats inside out.
2. Dunk Tulo in the fountain for a symbolic "rebirth"
3. Change the colors for one day to neons.
4. Hold the bats upside down and convince the pitcher to roll the ball instead.
5. Whenever the pitcher is about to throw, all fielders turn in a circle. You can just imagine the batter thinking, "what the heck?!" and then striking out badly.
6. Change the lineup so it's exactly like last year's. Sans Matsui, otherwise the same.
7. Send everyone into a deep hypnosis induced trance and make them believe that it's October 2007.
8. Clone them all. Genetically enhance the clones and have them play the games, then send the real ones out as a super secret crime fighting force, complete with Matrix-like soundtrack.
9. Blow raspberries at the DBacks.
10. Strategically placed trapdoors under the field that are used to remove players when they are not doing well. Players will remain in time out for five whole minutes before being allowed to return.
11. Geysers that randomly blow the bases off whenever an opponent is standing on it.
12. Secret voodoo rituals held on the very top of the rockpile under the full moon at midnight, then repeated at high noon.
13. Release Iannetta and Buchholz from the bullpen bathroom where they were locked all of last season via battering ram and an army of dancing robots.

Thirteen reasons. Anyone else have any ideas?
Aside: I just thought I lost this WHOLE post. I was going to be SO upset.