The Rockies minor league organizational All-Stars were selected by John Parker and milb.com. While those selected are solid choices, I think I probably would have gone a different direction with a few. I would have chosen the other catcher with Wilin Rosario. I think Jordan Pacheco's right there and probably underrated outside the organization, but I like the power at a higher level that Rosario had, and the better defense. For the outfielders, I likely would have selected Matt Miller, Charlie Blackmon and Rafael Ortega rather than Miller, Eliezer Mesa and Corey Dickerson. Blackmon was everything that Mesa was at a higher level, but also added some power to his bat. Ortega's season was actually a bit inferior to Dickerson's at Casper in the power department, but a bit better in the speed and defense to make up for it, so that's probably just a personal preference based on Ortega being a better prospect.
For pitchers, I likely would have chosen Chad Bettis or Albert Campos over Ethan Hollingsworth, Chris Balcom-Miller, Juan Nicasio or Cory Riordan, as Bettis and Campos were the only two RHP's in the system to show dominance over their leagues and levels.
The Rockies are actually listed as a team that has improved this offseason by somebody. That's progress. Usually we've fallen into the absent and non-noteworthy middle in these reports.
Thomas Harding has 10 questions for 2011. Of note would be that the Rockies may be putting the wrong rotation spot in jeopardy to give Felipe Paulino a crack, as Aaron Cook seems to be getting off easy for declining performance and it's Jason Hammel that's being put in danger of losing his role. Paulino and Hammel are actually similar pitchers in one key aspect, both have one of the fastest fastballs in the majors among starters (Paulino's was third to Ubaldo and Strasburg last year) but both FB's were value losers for the pitchers last year (Hammel at -9.5 runs, Paulino at -12.3). It's more typical that velocity translates to value with these pitches, that it didn't with either Hammel or Paulino should be of some concern.