2011 Colorado Rockies Game #94: Zack Greinke vs. Jhoulys Chacin

While not as pronounced as the home/road split that rotation mate Juan Nicasio has thus far in 2011, Jhoulys Chacin is still pretty clearly a more effective pitcher at Coors Field than he is away from it. He averages an inning more per start, he gives up fewer hits, walks and HR's, and he sees a spike in his K rate. Rockies starters overall have some weird bipolar issues when it comes to home/away splits this year. Chacin, Nicasio and Aaron Cook clearly seem to be deriving some benefit from the humidor and conditions at Coors Field that they can't quite replicate on the road. Meanwhile, Ubaldo Jimenez, Jason Hammel, Esmil Rogers and Clayton Mortensen have the more expected worse at Coors, better on the road split. In the case of Rogers, he's been an absolute disaster at home, but effective away, basically the reverse of Nicasio.

So what's making Chacin and Nicasio so effective at Coors Field but less so away? I have my theories, given that both rely heavily on FB command for the optimization of their secondary pitches, but I'm curious what other people think. At any rate, with Chacin on the mound at home, it's a good chance for an early win to this series, even with the very good opponent in Greinke on the opposite side.

GO ROCKIES!