Antonio Senzatela is returning to the Rockies rotation with a curveball

Antonio Senzatela returns to Rockies rotation rested and, he hopes, armed with a bigger arsenal | Denver Post

Senzatela is back in the rotation and set to start on Tuesday against the Royals. He's returned after a bullpen stint after seeing his velocity dip and hoping that, with a little rest and less innings, he'll regain his early-season form. He's also expanded his repertoire; he's added a curveball and adjusted his slider grip to give a bit more of a velocity dimension to his arsenal. Let's hope it makes a difference, but like Bud Black said, "A new pitch doesn't truly happen over night."

Gray gets start in opener vs. Royals | MLB.com

Rockies ace Jon Gray will face off against the Royals' Danny Duffy in Kansas City today. It will also be the first time Greg Holland will be back in Kansas City after spending six seasons with the team.

Rockies' Field of Dreams program continues to influence youth, high school baseball across Colorado | Denver Post

Back in 1995, then-Rockies manager Bob Gebhard started a program to build fields around Colorado to cultivate a budding interest in baseball in one of the newest major-league regions. It caught on with the players - on average the players would donate 20-50 thousand dollars per field and gave great baseball fields to kids all around Colorado, Wyoming, and Arizona. I grew up playing on many of these fields, can confirm it was a great program.

Defensive outfield tiers -- Ranking all 30 teams | ESPN ($)

Brian Reiff of ESPN ranked all 30 outfield defenses based on Defensive Runs Saved, "projected lineup construction going forward and my own observations from watching these players in the field."

He ranks the Rockies 29th out of 30 teams and offers this bit of analysis;

The Rockies and Athletics, for example, have struggled to control opposing teams' baserunning, specifically letting them take extra bases on balls hit to the outfield. They have allowed the two highest rates of extra bases taken among all major league teams.

There's also this statistic that's presented as evidence; The Rockies, in 309 hits to the outfield, opponents have taken extra bases in 166 of them, or 53.7 percent of the time.

That number is presented in a vacuum; it doesn't account for how large the Coors Field outfield is and, well, Coors. It's not as much of a launching pad as everyone likes to think, but it is a big stadium. Sure, the Rockies outfielders don't inspire a whole lot of confidence - Carlos Gonzalez is a great defensive player but is a tick slower this year - but ranking them 29th is out of 30 teams based on a stat that’s wildly skewed by the size of an outfield is ludicrous.

Rockies' Anderson 'fails' Players Weekend | MLB.com

Tyler Anderson will have an... interesting nickname on his jersey come Player's Weekend. Ricky F., the name Anderson will sport on his back, serves as a baseball reminder; pay attention on the basepaths.