Welcome to 5 Quick Questions, a series here at Mile High Sports where we will ask as many Colorado Rockies ballplayers as we can, and maybe a few coaches, front office members and media too, the same set of questions.
We will be keeping track of trends and making note of particularly fun or interesting answers while also adding a bit of context wherever it may be needed.
Next Up: Brenton Doyle and Austin Gomber
Who were your favorite players growing up?
Brenton Doylet: “Big Ryan Zimmerman fan. Going to Nats park a lot growing up I really liked watching him play.”
Austin Gomber: “Ken Griffey Jr.”
When you think of the Rockies, who is the first player who comes to mind?
Brenton Doyle: “Probably CarGo. I loved simulating that swing back in the day, playing wiffle ball. From the right side, yeah, you simulate lefty but you try to implement it.”
Austin Gomber: “Todd Helton.”
They say that the triple is the most exciting play in baseball. Do you agree and if not, what is?
Brenton Doyle: “Walk-offs are definitely the most exciting. Doesn’t matter if it’s a single, a double, a triple, or a homer, walk-offs are… it’s huge. You get Coors dumped on you and stuff. It’s awesome.”
Austin Gomber “Inside-the-park home run.”
If you could have any job in the world other than your own, what would it be?
Brenton Doyle: “I’m big into watching guys on YouTube do golf stuff and making a living on that. Travel around the country playing golf and making some humor out of it. Not PGA, I wanna have fun, get a group of guys, travel the country.”
That’s something that he could just do if he really wanted to, I mention.
“Maybe in the offseason,” he laughs.
Austin Gomber: “I guess like CEO of something.
I ask if there’s any business in particular he’d be interested in.
“Not specifically,” he says. “Being in charge.”
What is your favorite ballgame that you have played in?
Brenton Doyle: “Last night was pretty cool…I mean yeah…I think last night. It was awesome. The home runs contributed, I made some defensive plays…yeah I think I gotta go with last night.”
Austin Gomber: “In college, we played in the regional championship against North Carolina in Chapel Hill and it was like 14 innings. We lost but… yeah…great game.”
NOTES:
I happened to be having this conversation with Doyle on May 16. On May 15, he hit two home runs and made three dazzling defensive plays in center field in a 9-8 win over the Cincinnati Reds. It was the first multi-homer game of his career and just the second and third round-trippers total. He also hammered a double, scored three times, and drove in three.
I’ll have to check back with him in a few years and see if he’s topped it.
Gomber is the third player (Mike Moustakas, Brent Suter) to name Ken Griffey Jr and Doyle is the first to mention Ryan Zimmerman, the great two-way player who defined the Nationals first era in Washington.
Doyle had another first by bringing Carlos Gonzalez into the “All-Time Rockie” conversation while Gomber put in the sixth vote for Todd Helton. Helton holds a clear lead with Larry Walker and Charlie Blackmon tied at three votes apiece.
We’ve got our second vote for inside-the-park homer and our third for a walk-off of any kind.
Golf came up again but Doyle drew a distinction between himself and Kyle Freeland and Tyler Kinley who were a bit more hardcore with it. He’s fine just making the fun videos.
An alumna of Florida Atlantic University, Gomber becomes the second player to choose a game from before his professional days against a rival school. Interestingly both he and Kinley (who also did this) picked games in which their teams ultimately fell short. That’s baseball.