No money, more problems for the Rockies and MLB

I have good news and bad news. The good news is I have lots of fun, upbeat stories to talk about today!

The bad news is I was actually lying about the good news.

But I promise if you stick with me, we’ll eventually get to some cute pets. So at least we have that to look forward to.

Sources: MiLB Ready To Agree To Significant Reduction In Teams | Baseball America

MiLB “ready to agree” to cut around 40 minor league teams | Rox Pile

Ugh. This is rough. Remember how earlier this offseason MLB was like, “Hey, we’re getting rid of a bunch of minor league teams,” and MiLB was like, “Yeah, that’s not happening,” and then MLB was like, “We’re definitely doing it,” and then MiLB was like, “You’re not the boss of me,” and then Congress got involved?

Well, it looks like not having a source of revenue has really caused some problems for minor league teams, to the point that they’re ready to agree to cut 40 teams.

Unfortunately, as our friends at Rox Pile explain, this really hits the Mountain Time Zone hard. We’ll still have the Isotopes and the Salt Lake Bees, but we’ll lose the entirety of the Pioneer League, leaving us with only five professional baseball teams in this time zone.

It also hits the Rockies hard. They’ll lose the Grand Junction Rockies of the Pioneer League and the Lancaster JetHawks of the California League. In addition, the Rockies currently have eight minor league affiliates, but this restructure would result in each team having only four MiLB affiliates.

So that sucks.

Rosenthal: Manfred will allow teams to furlough or reduce pay to some employees | The Athletic ($)

A clause in major league employees’ contracts says that in the event of a national emergency, they might not get paid. And guess what. We’re in the middle of a national emergency.

This means managers, coaches, front-office staff, and scouts could all be furloughed or have their pay cut (at each individual team’s discretion). That sounds bad except that the alternative might be them getting fired and losing their health insurance. Which seems like it might be worse right now.

So that sucks.

Sources: Majority of MLB teams to pay baseball ops staff through May | ESPN

Eighteen of the 30 major league teams have already committed to paying their operations staffs through May. This includes the Rockies, but not the cash-strapped Yankees, Red Sox, Dodgers, or Nationals. And none of these discussions about MLB employees include contractors or subcontractors.

But still, good for those teams.

FanPulse: Baseball fans are not in favor of the Arizona/Florida “plans” | SB Nation FanPulse via Purple Row

I am also not a fan of a plan that treats players like bobbleheads that only come to life at night to play baseball for our entertainment.

Trevor Story Staying Sharp, Misses Colorado Rockies Teammates ‘Greatly’ | CBSN Denver

Trevor Story is at home in Texas, working out and doing philanthropy and not-baseball things.

“I feel like we’re doing something wrong,” he says of this whole not-baseball world we live in right now. “I feel like we should be playing ball right now and grinding with my teammates and everybody.”

Trevor Story is a real rule-follower, isn’t he? I feel like his YA novel love interest character just got a lot more interesting.

Rockies’ Top 5 shortstops: Harding’s take | MLB.com

Speaking of Trevor Story, where does he fall on your list of greatest Rockies shortstops?

Thomas Harding ranks him second. I think I might rank him higher.

Yes, I know what the numbers say. It’s just how I feel, OK?

★ ★ ★

And now the moment you’ve all been waiting for (unless you already went to last week’s Rockpile and looked at the results of the polls)!

Most Interested In That Thing Off To His Left: Charlie Blackmon

Charlie Blackmon is not impressed.

Photo by Rob Tringali/Getty Images

Cutest Pet: Kona and Benny Freeland

Kona and Benny narrowly beat Whistle Hoffman for this one, but honestly, there are no wrong answers when it comes to cute pets.

Except for Charlie Blackmon’s fish. That might have been the wrong answer.

Photo from @konabear_and_bennythejet on Instagram

But wait! There’s more!

Rather than having our usual photo polls this week, we’re going to do a special supplemental poll to determine...

The National League’s Top Dog

Kona and Benny are among the nominees, along with nine other players’ dogs. You can vote for your favorites, or just look at the cute pet pictures. Check it out here!