Quick Hits: Venezuela, Rockies, Gregorius

Venezuelan players are having trouble living at home in the offseason due to unrest there, Jorge L. Ortiz of USA Today writes. Cubs catcher Miguel Montero tried going to Venezuela this winter but was only able to stay five days. “I would go from the place where I was trying to get my passport to the house and back. That’s it,” Montero said. “There are safety concerns anywhere in the world, but you watch the news about Venezuela and more people have been killed there than in Afghanistan.” Many Venezuelan stars, like Felix Hernandez and Miguel Cabrera, have established permanent homes in the U.S., with others trying to become permanent U.S. residents. Here are more notes from around the big leagues.

• The Rockies should consider using a sort of starter platoon system, with some starters pitching in Denver as much as possible and some regularly pitching on the road, to help combat the Coors Field effect, FanGraphs’ Mike Petriello writes. To make the plan work, the Rockies might need a sixth starter, and they would have to frequently shuttle pitchers back and forth from Triple-A. The plan would give a starter like Jorge De La Rosa, the rare pitcher who seems to thrive at Coors Field, more chances to pitch there. Petriello looks through the Rockies’ schedule and comes up with a way to allow De La Rosa to make 20 of 34 starts at home. It now appears likely that De La Rosa will begin the season on the disabled list, so he won’t actually be able to make 34 starts, and the Rockies’ rotation probably has enough immediate concerns heading into the season that it can’t try something this experimental right now. But it’s an interesting idea.
• Didi Gregorius is earning over-the-top praise in Yankees camp, FOX Sports’ Ken Rosenthal writes. “[Gregorius] has made plays from the hole, from his back foot, throwing the ball 90 mph across the diamond from his back foot. You don’t see that,” says Alex Rodriguez. “It also makes it a lot easier for your third baseman to play third base.” (The rest of the A-Rod quotes alone make Rosenthal’s article worth reading — Rodriguez talks about Gregorius like a scout, complete with repeated references to a variant of the 20-to-80 scouting scale used to evaluate ballplayers. Also check out the sidebar, in which Rodriguez describes how shifts changed the game just in the year he was suspended.) As Derek Jeter’s replacement, Gregorius has big shoes to fill, but he’s getting great reviews so far, at least defensively.