Cliché alert: As far as injuries are concerned, the Rockies are in mid-season form. While nobody on the team has experienced a serious injury, the aches and pains are both keeping players off the field and are adding up.
Jorge De La Rosa won't start his season until he gets about three more spring starts, according to Patrick Saunders. Considering that he's not currently scheduled to throw, that means De La Rosa likely won't return until near the end of April at the earliest.
The Rockies scratched intended stopgap David Hale from his start on Tuesday with an strained oblique. Hale likely won't be available until late April either. It's worth mentioning that Hale was the most likely candidate to take Jhoulys Chacin's spot in the rotation after the latter's release. We're in that space where we start asking about the backups to the backups.
Twenty four hours ago it looked like Jon Gray was going to break camp with the team. But if the "mild groin tightness" he's now experiencing either persists or becomes more than mild, he won't make his next start and will probably begin the season in the minors. Groin tightness is nothing to be alarmed about, but it is the same malady keeping De La Rosa off the mound. We now may be looking at an Opening Day rotation of Kyle Kendrick, Jordan Lyles, Eddie Butler, Tyler Matzek, and Christian Bergman. Reference and transition:
<blockquote class="twitter-tweet" data-partner="tweetdeck"><p>Update from <a href="https://twitter.com/hashtag/Rockies?src=hash">#Rockies</a> clubhouse: <a href="https://twitter.com/CarGoMedia5">@CarGoMedia5</a> said knee is fine, will play tomorrow; Dickerson's back OK; Jon Gray has mild groin tightness</p>— Patrick Saunders (@psaundersdp) <a href="https://twitter.com/psaundersdp/status/582226198303920128">March 29, 2015</a></blockquote>
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Carlos Gonzalez left Friday's game in the fourth inning with knee fatigue. CarGo talked to Patrick Saunders; he told him "I talked to Doogie (Keith Dugger) and he said it's normal." It's encouraging that he'll be in the lineup tomorrow. In other news, the players evidently call Keith Dugger "Doogie."
Corey Dickerson left yesterday's game with lower back tightness. It appears that he'll be fine. Dickerson isn't on the lineup card for either of the Rockies two tilts today.
Like I said: There's no indication that any of these injuries are serious. But it would still be nice to have more than two-fifths of the expected rotation and two loud bats make it through spring completely unscathed. On the bright side, at least Tro