Rockies Option Brendan Rodgers; Peter Lambert Undergoes Tommy John Surgery
The Rockies have set their 30-man, Opening Day roster, per a club announcement. Notably, top infield prospect Brendan Rodgers did not make the cut and has been optioned to the team’s alternate site. The club also revealed that righty Peter Lambert, who has been sidelined with forearm pain, underwent Tommy John surgery and has been placed on the 45-day injured list. Placing Lambert on the 45-day IL opens a 40-man spot which was needed to accommodate the selection of non-roster players Matt Kemp, Daniel Bard and Chris Owings, which were reported last week.
That Rogers didn’t make the cut comes as something of a surprise. Shoulder surgery torpedoed his would-be debut campaign last year — he received 81 plate appearances before being injured — but the former No. 3 overall pick is still viewed as a top prospect and vital part of the Rockies’ future. While he won’t begin the year with the club, it still seems safe to expect that Rodgers will get a decent run in the big leagues this year, so long as he’s healthy. With Trevor Story entrenched at shortstop through at least 2021, Rodgers’ most immediate path to the everyday lineup is at second base.
The addition of the universal DH in 2020 should allow Colorado to play Daniel Murphy at DH more, with Ryan McMahon occupying first base, which would ostensibly clear a spot for Rodgers. For the time being, though, perhaps the preference is to get Garrett Hampson and McMahon some reps at the keystone while continuing to work Rodgers back into to MLB readiness.
The loss of Lambert not only for this season but for most or all of 2021 also stings for the club. He wasn’t expected to open the year in the Rockies’ rotation, but he was considered to be among the organization’s premier pitching prospects heading into 2019 and even made the back of some top 100 rankings at the time. Last year’s MLB debut didn’t go well to say the least — 72 runs in 89 1/3 innings — but Lambert only recently turned 23 this summer. He may be out until the 2022 season at this point, though he’s at least young enough that he has ample time to bounce back and still establish himself in the big leagues while in the midst of his prime years.
Rockies Provide Timetable On Peter Lambert Injury
Rockies right-hander Peter Lambert, diagnosed with a forearm strain a month ago, is progressing through a rehab program but is still three to four weeks from being cleared to throw, pitching coach Steve Foster tells reporters (Twitter link via Kyle Newman of the Denver Post).
At the time of Lambert’s injury, Colorado declined to put a timetable on his recovery, with reports indicating that he was expected to miss “significant” time. Today’s news from Foster doesn’t provide an expected return to game readiness, but the fact that he’s close to a month from even beginning a throwing program suggests that he’s multiple months away from that point. Any early throwing Lambert does would of course be limited, and he’d need time to ramp up to long toss, throwing off a mound, facing live hitters, etc.
Lambert, 23 next week, is hardly a household name but is a young hurler of some note within the organization’s ranks. He was the club’s second-round pick (44th overall) back in 2015 and steadily rose through the minor league system, ultimately making his big league debut in 2019. He started 19 games for the Rox with woeful results (7.25 ERA, 5.97 FIP), but this time last year, Lambert was considered one of the organization’s best overall prospects. On a national scale, Eric Longenhagen and Kiley McDaniel ranked him as the game’s No. 120 overall prospect heading into the season. At that point, he was fresh off a 2018 season that saw him toss 148 innings of 3.28 ERA ball with a 106-to-27 K/BB ratio and a grounder rate just shy of 50 percent between Double-A and Triple-A.
Even a healthy Lambert wouldn’t have been a lock to begin the year in Colorado’s rotation. Jon Gray, German Marquez and Kyle Freeland seemed like locks, while out-of-options hurlers Antonio Senzatela and Jeff Hoffman were slated to vie for rotation spots along with Lambert, Chi Chi Gonzalez and others (including non-roster invitee Ubaldo Jimenez). The delayed start to the year could conceivably give Lambert enough time to reenter that mix, depending on when (or if) a second training camp is able to come together.
Rockies’ Peter Lambert Suffers Forearm Strain
TODAY: The Rockies have termed Lambert’s injury as a forearm strain, as per The Athletic’s Nick Groke (Twitter link) and other reporters. While the club is waiting for the results of Lambert’s medical tests, the righty is expected to “miss significant time.”
MARCH 10: Rockies right-handed starter Peter Lambert departed tonight’s Cactus League game early, according to Nick Groke of The Athletic. Colorado manager Bud Black chalked the exit up to “forearm tightness,” before ominously adding, “fingers crossed.”
The precautionary measure of taking Lambert out of the game is certainly understandable, as forearm issues can often be harbingers of more serious elbow troubles down the line.
Lambert, who will turn 23 on April 18th, was a second-round draft pick of the Rockies back in 2015. He made his MLB debut last year, logging 89 1/3 innings over 19 starts. Though he produced a bloated 7.25 ERA during that stretch, the Rockies surely believe the young hurler is capable of improvement. After all, it was only two weeks ago that Black considered him a possibility to obtain the fifth spot in the Opening Day rotation, along with Jeff Hoffman and Chi Chi Gonzalez. The club’s optimism is at least somewhat borne out by the fact that FIP liked Lambert’s 2019 better, pegging him at 5.97 for the year.
If Lambert has to miss time, the Rockies will have to look elsewhere to fill out their rotation behind Jon Gray, German Marquez, Kyle Freeland and Antonio Senzatela. The team had one of the worst rotations in 2019 and did little to improve it during the offseason, the most notable signing being righty Jose Mujica, who missed all of 2019 while recovering from Tommy John surgery. That seemingly leaves the aforementioned Hoffman and Gonzalez as the frontrunners for the fifth slot, assuming Lambert is out of the race.
The team could theoretically turn to the free agent market to add another arm. But with Opening Day just over two weeks away, it would be difficult getting a starter stretched out in time. And attracting free agent pitchers to make their living in Coors Field is difficult in the best of times.
Rockies To Promote Peter Lambert
The Rockies will promote Peter Lambert from Triple-A in time for the 22-year-old right-hander to start tomorrow’s game against the Cubs, according to several reports. The Athletic’s Nick Groke tweets that Lambert is already at Wrigley Field today in preparation for his upcoming Major League debut.
A second-round pick for the Rockies (44th overall) in the 2015 draft, Lambert has a 3.92 ERA, 7.5 K/9, and 3.61 K/BB over 508 professional innings. Those numbers include a troubling 5.07 ERA in 60 1/3 Triple-A frames this season, though an inflated 1.5 HR/9 in the hitter-friendly Pacific Coast League could be an explanation.
Prior to the season, ESPN.com’s Keith Law (subscription required) ranked Lambert as the 92nd-best prospect in baseball, describing the righty as owning a repeatable delivery and a quality four-pitch mix, even if nothing in Lambert’s arsenal is considered a true plus pitch. Lambert’s fastball is in the 94-95mph range, while he has generated consistently good ground-ball rates of close to 50% throughout his minor league career.
Lambert will get his chance in a Rockies rotation that has struggled to match its strong results from last season, as German Marquez and Jon Gray have been Colorado’s only consistently good starters. As of sign how quickly things have changed from 2018 to 2019 for the Rockies’ staff, Lambert will take the place of Kyle Freeland, a fourth-place finisher in NL Cy Young voting last season who was sent down to Triple-A last week after scuffling badly in his first 12 outings this year.