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In the spectrum of baseball, there is nothing worse than August baseball when your team is out of contention. The Draft is over, so there's no longer that to look forward to. The Trade Deadline has passed, so there's no more trepidation about who is or isn't going to be moved. At this point in the season, we're kind of just going through the motions.
But the Rockies apparently aren't.
Tracy: Rockies won’t quit despite deep hole | On the Rox — Colorado Rockies news — Denver Post
I simultaneously get and don't get this. On one side, they can't very well say "yep, we sucked somethin' fierce the first 4 months of the season. We're just trying to get this over with". On the other side, it's just foolish at this point to think that the postseason is still an option. The best quote from the article comes from Troy Tulowitzki:
"You hate to look at the past, but if we would have just been OK the past week or two, this thing would really be close."
Really? 1 or 2 games, and suddenly the Rockies are back in this thing? Again, we're talking about posturing here to some degree, and I admire the Rockies for this particular form of delusion. I think everyone would be far more disgusted with them responding realistically. Players are supposed to say things like this so that we can sit back here in our golden analyst palace and tell it how it REALLY is.
Look, whatever happens the rest of the season, play hard and don't make it easy on the opposition, but for Pete's sake, don't freaking hurt yourselves either. Just play good baseball and make it fun to watch.
In other super important news, Josh Roenicke was called up from AAA Colorado Springs to take Greg Reynolds' spot. That was fast. Roenicke was a waiver claim from the Blue Jays, and in 22 Sky Sox games has a 3.64 ERA, a 3.14 K/BB ratio, a winning smile and has (used to have?) a smokin' hot girlfriend. This move adds depth for the Rockies' pen so we don't blow any other arms out as we head down the hot, boring stretch towards September.
Seriously, losing baseball in August is like driving through the Nevada desert. Or Kansas.
Veteran Millwood granted his release | | projo.com | The Providence Journal | Pawtucket Red Sox
So Kevin Millwood has been starting with Boston's AAA affiliate for the course of the season. He apparently has no shot at making the majors with Boston (and given Boston's general pitching situation, this kind of comes as a surprise), so he requested his release. Over 13 starts in AAA have resulted in a 4.28 ERA (3.70 FIP) with solid strikeout and walk numbers.
Millwood has been linked to the Rockies in the past, so it wouldn't be farfetched to see Colorado give his agent a call, especially if they're less than sold on the possibility of Mortensen/Reynolds/Friedrich/Whoever keeping the bullpen workload manageable.