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This is the time of year when we make prospect lists. There is no baseball, except in some Latin American countries and Australia, and spring training will give us plenty of time to overreact to small sample sizes and prognosticate about the upcoming season for our big-league club. Before all that happens, though, we make prospect lists.
The Colorado Rockies have had nice showings recently on many of these lists from top pitching prospects Jon Gray and Eddie Butler, but not far behind -- and depending on your criteria, just barely behind -- is outfielder David Dahl.
He appears at No. 100 on the Baseball Prospectus list, is 55th overall on MLB.com, and sits 31st on this (admittedly odd but still interesting) list of the top 2,000 prospects in baseball.
Dahl is generally considered the third best prospect in the Rockies system at worst (and ranked as such in Purple Row's PuRPs list), but as those aforementioned pitchers inch closer to the big leagues, he inches closer to being the top prospect in the system.
Anyone who follows David on Twitter (@ddahl21) knows that he has spent most of the offseason working out and pining for the days when baseball will return, so I figured we should ask him about that and he kindly agreed. Here is that exchange.
Drew Creasman: Thanks for taking the time answer a couple of questions. We have some workout junkies here at Purple Row and I've noticed no shortage of workout-related tweets coming from your account, so I figured we'd focus on that. First, what kind or work/training was needed to rehab your injury, and how is it feeling now?
David Dahl: At first, the work for my injury was to just rest it and let the healing process begin. It was a very slow process to get it healed. It started to feel really good in September and that's when I went out to Cali to really start strengthening it. As of now it feels great with no problems. It's like I never even had an injury in the first place.
DC: I had heard you spent some time in California doing come conditioning work. What can you tell us about that?
DD: When I got out to Cali I worked out at this place called Sparta. I went for 8 weeks and I would go twice a day Monday through Thursday and once a day on Saturday. So that's 9 workouts a week. They straight up crushed me.
Out of nine workouts, I would say for 6-7 I was doing some type of workout to strengthen my legs. The logic behind it was to crush me every day and build up strength but also build endurance in my legs. They said since you are running and using your legs every day during the season why not work them out a lot so they can get used to it. During the season I always get sore really fast cause my legs are so weak.
Since they worked out my legs so much, after about three weeks being there my legs would not get sore or tired. My Monday is usually a strength day so I would do squats, box jumps, single leg squat and another type of jumps. Then I would do some type of sprints after that and then end with an upper body workout.
DC: Have you been focusing on a particular part of your game when working out? Do you think about things like added pop in the bat or better speed on the base paths when going through your process or is it more just about getting in the best shape you can?
DD: My focus this off season has been to just get stronger but also be able to move really well. I've lost a lot of bad weight and have leaned out a lot. Last off season I tried putting on weight so I could add more power but I learned that's not how you do it. Now I'm as strong as I ever have been, but I'm also moving as well as I ever have.
DC: What has been the best non-baseball part(s) of your off season?
DD: I would say the best non-baseball part of my off season has been spending time with my family. I'm not home much so when I am I love to take advantage of that. Another one was going on vacation to Turks and Caicos with my host family from Grand Junction and their family. That was probably one of the best weeks of my life there.
DC: What are your goals for the 2014 season and what are you most looking forward to when you get back on the field?
DD: My goal for this 2014 season is to stay healthy and take what I've done this off season into the season. I'm just gonna go out there and give it everything I have, taking it day by day, and everything else will take care of itself. I'm most looking forward to just getting back to competing against other players.
I would like to thank David Dahl for talking with Purple Row and wish him a healthy and prosperous 2014.
