History lesson: Why the Rockies don’t attempt to sign free-agent aces | The Denver Post ($)
The Rockies need pitchers. When you look at the final weeks of the 2019 season, many of the pitchers in the starting rotation were names we had to learn, look-up or ask, “how do I know this name?” Did you have to Google, “Tim Melville,” or brush up on who Chi Chi Gonzalez was? If the Rockies want to sign any big names this year, they’d have to find money somewhere, and according to owner Dick Monfort, there is no money to be found. And perhaps a big name signing woudn’t do any good, anyway.
In the past the Rockies signed names like Denny Neagle and Mike Hampton, but those proved to be big busts. Dan O’Dowd, former GM for the Rockies and current MLB Network analyst, knew that were lessons to be learned from those signings, though.
The upside to the Hampton and Neagle signings, O’Dowd said, was the realization that if the Rockies were ever going to win, they were going to have to do it through a draft-and-development approach as opposed to big-name signings.
Could the Rockies benefit from signing big name pitchers? Or should they stick to developing pitchers and spend this winter finding a starting catcher?
Could Colorado lose all of its minor league teams? Yes, I know this has been talked about... a lot. The MLB proposal would change the minor league system as we know it. I think everyone agrees that something needs to happen, but I’m not sure if something as drastic as the current proposal is the right move. There are a lot of communities that would be impacted by eliminating minor league teams. It’s estimated that in 2019 the Rocky Mountain Vibes had a total economic impact of $20 million in the Colorado Springs area and the Grand Junction Rockies had a total economic impact of $13.68 million. I imagine these communities won’t give up without a fight.
Bud Black: A True Student-Athlete | San Diego State University
I love hearing stories of how players and managers made their way to Major League Baseball. Bud Black, a graduate of San Diego State University, was known as a good student and a good athlete. He graduated in 1979 with his degree in management. Black says that he still remembers what he learned in college and still uses those management skills to this day.