Everyone is very familiar with the definition of insanity, so there’s no reason to shove it down your throat once again. And everyone is very familiar with how the Colorado Rockies have embodied that definition.
The Rockies have been laughingly, depressingly predictable. That was until now or at least that’s what everyone at 20th and Blake want the populous of Denver to believe.
Dan O’Dowd is out and Jeff Bridich is in.
Bill Geivett is no longer looking over Walt Weiss’s shoulder.
And finally maybe the most important change, the strength and conditioning staff has been replaced.
What has all of this change netted the Colorado Rockies? Nothing. Start banging your head against a wall now Rockies’ fans because this season is going to be more of the same.
Rockies fans are being sold a bill of goods and they should already be asking for a refund.
There is no questioning that there is a group of different faces in important positions at Coors Field. And, you may be thinking that it’s far too early to doubt that group. That is until you take a closer look at the faces in crowd.
Let’s start with Bridich.
The Rockies biggest offseason move was jettisoning O’Dowd and hiring one of his disciples. How is that change? There’s really only two ways to look at Colorado’s new general manager and neither speaks volumes about the guy now making decisions.
First, the people saying Bridich isn’t O’Dowd are simply regurgitating the company line, not the truth. He is O’Dowd 2.0.
Second, if Bridich did disagree with his former bosses direction, no one listened to him or he simply never spoke up. If the latter is true, the Rockies have their version of Brian Xanders, a glorified yes man. As for the former, that no one listened to him, I find that an unlikely scenario. Not because that organization makes a habit of disrespecting people, quite the opposite is true, but rather those in that organization have a habit of surrounding themselves with like-minded people.
All signs point to Bridich being more of the same; that’s a major concern.
The other major concern is the health of the players on the field, hence the new strength and conditioning team. It’s no secret that Rockies have to find away to keep Troy Tulowitzki, Carlos Gonzalez and Company on the field. The early results for making this happen have been troubling.
Colorado is already facing the prospect of starting the season with their best pitcher on the disabled list. Jorge De La Rosa is battling a sore groin that’s caused Weiss to shut him down for the rest of spring training and put his April 10th home-opening start in jeopardy.
The more things change the more they stay the same.
De La Rosa is looking at missing five weeks because of a strain. This is a pattern with the Rockies and no longer can the continual string of injuries be viewed as coincidence. The strength and conditioning program isn’t the only problem. Keith Duggar and his staff are failing miserably at getting the players back on the field (yesterday, Zach Fogg highlighted two great examples of this).
It appears that changing the training staff but not the doctors responsible for their care isn’t going to solve the health issues for the Rockies.
There’s been a lot made about the changes seen at Coors Field since last season. They’ve been heralded by the Rockies as the main reason for optimism. They’re not asking Denver to accept a new philosophy, because Bridich hasn’t provided one, or new blood. Their asking fans to accept the same crap sandwich on new bread.
It’s true, the Colorado Rockies spent the offseason trying to break free of their monotonous insanity. But really, they just made change for the sake of change. That isn’t always an inherently bad thing until you realize that all they did was rearrange the deck chairs on the Titanic.
