Monday Rockpile: Rockies suffered another injury Sunday, but at least this time it was only to Corey Dickerson's ego

The Rockies have losing down to an art. Over the last five games, they've lost 4-2 despite having ten more at bats with runners in scoring position, they've lost by getting no hit, they've lost despite scoring ten runs (this is actually the third time this year they pulled that one off), they've lost by allowing three runs to score on a wild pitch in one of the most embarrassing plays ever, and then yesterday they lost in part because Corey Dickerson fell down running home when he didn't represent the tying run in the ninth inning. Over the weekend, the offense put up 19 runs in three games and the team still got swept. That's what happens when you're forced to run out your 11th, 12th, and whatever best pitcher Tyler Matzek is in a series against a good offense.

There's a bunch of informative stuff in this link from Thomas Harding.

1) Eddie Butler has been cleared to begin throwing. This story also has some notes on preventative maintenance Butler can do in the future to prevent more DL stints.

2) Corey Dickerson talks about his gaffe in the ninth inning yesterday. I hated to see that happen to him because there's nobody on this team who busts it harder out of the box on a daily basis than Dickerson. There's a fine line between working hard and working smart however, and Dickerson got a major lesson in that department yesterday afternoon. It will be easy to forgive him if he keeps raking at the plate.

3) Harding also has a couple of quotes from Rob Scahill who's back with the big club and actually kept the Rockies in the game yesterday in his first MLB outing of 2014.

4) Tyler Chatwood and Brett Anderson each are scheduled to throw live bullpen sessions today. Boone Logan, who started throwing BP late last week, still needs more tie before heading out on a rehab assignment. Then there's also Rafael Betancourt who is working his way back from Tommy John surgery last season and hopes to throw a live BP session on Tuesday.

5) Christian Bergman has an MRI on his left hand scheduled for today. If it reveals more bad news on the injury front, which is probably a good bet since this is the 2014 Rockies, Colorado will have to dive even further into its reserves.

The good news is that there's several key pitchers on the mend. The bad news is that there's still no definitive time table for any of them, which means the Rockies are stuck with the pure garbage they currently have at the bottom of the rotation for at least a couple more trips around while they face team after team with deep lineups. The Rockies have to start winning the games with Jorge De La Rosa and Jhoulys Chacin on the mound, because if bad Tyler Matzek shows up with Bergman and Friedrich, its probably going to take double digit runs for the Rockies to win, and as we saw on Friday, sometimes even that won't be enough.

Terri Frei talks about Wilin Rosario's role and how hes progressing as a defensive catcher. In other Wilin Rosario news, he picked up seven hits in ten at bats over the weekend including three extra base hits. This could be important because Rosario had a noticeably more open stance which may have helped his production. Then again, the Milwaukee staff was foolishly giving more fastballs than just about any team I've seen this season, so well have to wait and see how this develops.

Eno Sarris of Fox Sports has an excellent piece on Justin Morneau's reemergence this season. Specifically, he dives into Morneau's ability to spray the ball all over the field, and even how that helps him on the road.

When the Rockies visited the Dodgers last week, Troy Tulowitzki told Steve Dilbeck of the Los Angeles Times that he doesn't think he's a finished product yet, and that he's still trying to get better as a player. I've talked extensively on this site about all the things Troy Tulowitzki has done to get better and how he still had more levels he could unlock as a player, but this time, I think gone about as high as he can go. Unless he can take his pitch recognition skills up even higher (something he's already improved upon this season), he's pretty close to his ceiling as a player now.

James Merilatt of Mile High Sports calls for something many fans here have been calling for since about late 2011; a new team president. He also dives into some other ideas (some of which I disagree with), but it's a good brainstorming piece.

Around MLB

The Padres fired general manager Josh Byrnes yesterday. This ought to reignite the calls for Dan O'Dowd's head.

More Padres news: Reliever Alex Torres became the first pitcher to wear MLB's new padded cap over the weekend as protection against line drives to the head. You can hardly notice it right?

The St. Louis Cardinals, who currently occupy the second Wild Card Spot, had to put both Jaime Garcia and Michael Wacha on the DL. The extent of both shoulder injuries are somewhat unclear at the moment, but looking at the NL standings, they may have a massive impact on how many games it takes to win that second Wild Card.