Welcome to SB Nation FanPulse, a survey of fans across MLB. Each week, we send 30 polls to plugged in fans from each team. Rockies fans, sign up HERE to join FanPulse.
Since the beginning of the season, Rockies fans who signed up for SB Nation’s FanPulse have received a brief weekly survey. The two consistent questions are about confidence in Bud Black, and “confidence in the direction of the team.” The results for the Black question haven’t been all that interesting — they’ve ranged between 92% and 100% “yes.” The other question is interesting to track though.
Compared to the previous poll, Rockies fan confidence is down six percentage points, going from 83% to 77%. Interestingly, the Rockies went 3-2 in between those two survey results (the surveys go out on Monday). To a certain extent, the team confidence question can be mapped onto how well the team has been playing — the low point was in the midst of the losing streak early in the season. But these results suggest that the responses may not necessarily reflect feelings based on the most recent results. Then again, the decline in confidence could also have something to do with the fact that the pitching staff gave up 32 runs in those five games. Despite winning three of them, maybe there were some bad feelings rumbling.
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We also asked a more specific question this week:“Do you think the Rockies will make the postseason in 2019?” For this question, fans were markedly less optimistic: 62% said no, while 38% said yes.
There’s overall confidence in the direction of the team beyond this season, but as far as this season goes, fans on the whole don’t see the Rockies playing in October. One of the tricky things about comparing week-to-week results with these surveys is that the number of fans surveyed likely changes (I don’t know how many votes there are). But we can compare these questions directly, as it’s not likely that survey takers decided to abandon a 30 second survey 25 seconds in. The results make sense to me at least, as I’m probably in the “confident overall but not really for this season” camp.
Let’s see what happens next week, and where feelings land. It’s all more interesting the more people vote. Also, if you have a question you think would be fun to ask on next week’s poll, drop it in the comments.