The Rockies’ signing of Greg Holland — who has a 1.14 ERA, 12.2 K/9, 4.2 BB/9 and 23 saves in 23 2/3 innings thus far after missing the entire 2016 season to injury — was the best free agent move of the offseason, ESPN’s Buster Olney writes. With all the uncertainty surrounding Holland’s return to the mound, Olney writes, the Rockies focused on learning about Holland’s character. Rockies bullpen coach Darren Holmes, who, like Holland, has an offseason home in Asheville, North Carolina, was a key to the team’s attempt to find out about Holland. “I know he’s got the trust of everybody — and he’s got the trust in spades,” says Rockies GM Jeff Bridich of Holland. “This is a man who is hell-bent on getting back to where he was before he was hurt.” Joining the Rockies on the list of teams who made the best offseason signings are the Pirates, Rays, Red Sox, Cubs and others. Here’s more from out of Colorado.
- Manager Bud Black has been a key to the Rockies’ surprisingly strong season, writes Paul Sullivan of the Chicago Tribune. The best quote in the piece, though, comes from Nolan Arenado, who explains why Holland has been such a breath of fresh air for the Rockies. “He seems in so much control,” says Arenado. “Closers here since I’ve been here, they’ve haven’t been very, uh, you know, you’ve been kind of nervous when they come in. When he comes in the game, it feels really good.”
- The Rockies’ pitching staff is having success this year with the help of an inexperienced catcher, Tony Wolters, Nick Groke of the Denver Post writes. Earlier this week, former Dodgers scouting director Logan White told MLBTR contributor Chuck Wasserstrom about his team’s decision to draft an infielder named Russell Martin and convert him to catcher. Wolters began his pro career as a shortstop and second baseman, then underwent a similar conversion that began in the Indians organization in 2013. He’s now winning praise for his work behind the plate, just as Martin ultimately did. “Kevin Cash was living with me that spring,” says Indians manager Terry Francona. (Cash, now the Rays’ manager, was then the Indians’ bullpen coach.) “We’d go home at night and if there wasn’t a college basketball game on, then we’d talk about baseball. And we were going back and forth. And I said, ’Man, he looks like he can do this.'”
It’s easy to describe Holland as a bargain signing now, but as Olney points out, he did not showcase particularly before he was signed, so any team that signed him was taking a pretty big gamble. Fortunately for the Rockies it paid off, along with other long-shots.
That’s what sets the Rockies apart, they took the chance no one else would because they saw something no one else did.
I agree with half of what you said. They took a chance not so much because they saw something nobody else did, but because taking this gamble was their only real opportunity to pick up a quality closer. None of the others on the market at the time were in their price range.
Exactly. They saw that he was the cheapest option with an excellent track record. If it worked, great; if not, oh well – “at least we tried” they’d say. And with the way his contract is setup, his $15 mil option for 2018 doesn’t kick in until he makes 50 appearances or closes 30 games I believe. So if he pitched like garbage or got hurt again, they’d only be out $6 mil over 1 year. Not really going out on much of a limb there.
Thankfully for them it has worked out excellently thus far and they look like geniuses. But don’t kid yourself and believe they “saw something no one else did.” They saw exactly what everyone else did and figured it was worth taking a shot because they couldn’t (and/or didn’t want to) pay the big money closers.
It will be interesting to see how the season unfolds-particularly when the Rockies meet the Dodgers in upcoming games. At least the Rockies now have a closer just as good or better than the L.A. guy.
Holland has been very good, no question, but nobody is touching Jansen at the moment. He’s got 42 SOs in 25 innings and given up exactly zero BBs. FIP of 0.40. That’s just on another planet.
But thats a 0.00 K/BB. Thats horrible! Just kidding, but jansen is another species, called Pitcherificus Nasty
Math geek alert: the ratio is infinity.
Computer programming geek alert: divide by zero error.
Really? Don’t think so!
It is so good to see our division so strong.
Dodgers will be forced to play better every day to keep up with Rox. Diamondbacks playing so well too at the moment.
I am very excited to see how this season pans out. Can Rockies rookie pitching staff maintain the level they are at?
Can Dodgers starters last longer than 4-5 innings?
Can Bellinger now fight back with corrections now that league pitchers have figured him out a little more. Or will he be just another guy that has low .240 average that hits 30 HR a year?
This is why I love baseball so much.