Every Rockies season, game and inning feels like déjà vu. Whether it’s atrocious starting pitching, the bullpen being a complete mess or key strikeouts by key players in big moments, nothing changes. Those covering the Rockies could easily write the same stories game-after-game, year-after-year.
The never-ending cycle of dreadful, mind-numbing baseball is frustrating to watch. And, listening to the rhetoric on how to fix it is exhausting. Because, in reality, there’s no right answer to solving the problems that exist at 20th and Blake – short of the Monforts selling the team and that isn’t happening anytime soon (if ever).
Only one solution is left. It’s time to stop caring about the Colorado Rockies’ record. Baseball fans in this town need to throw in the proverbial towel and become bandwagon fans. I promise it’ll make everyone much happier.
There’s a very vocal crowd that blasts the 40,000 plus fans that show up to Coors Field on a nightly basis.
“You’re part of the problem!”
“All you’re doing is lining the pockets of two inept owners!”
“You’re providing positive reinforcement to a loser!”
These are just some of the things being yelled from the rooftops by diehard baseball elitists and media members. But the truth is those 40,000 “bandwagon” fans are ahead of the curve. They’ve accepted the reality of the situation; it’s time everyone does the same.
Here’s the reality: The Colorado Rockies are only going to contend for division titles when the stars align and lady luck is on their side i.e “Rocktober” (or as some have come to call it “Fluketober”). If anyone thinks that the 2007 season was anything other than an anomaly, they are delusional. Colorado needed everything to go their way that year and they got it and they haven’t ever come close to replicating that success.
That’s because there isn’t a route that puts this team on the road to competing year in and year out.
It’s been suggested that Jeff Bridich and his band of monkeys should trade away every asset they have – Carlos Gonzalez, Troy Tulowitzki, Jorge De La Rosa, D.J. LeMahieu, Nolan Arenado, Corey Dickerson, etc. – for top young pitching prospects. When has that ever worked for the Rockies? Never.
Based on this team’s track record, there’s no reason to believe a) that they’d get any decent arms in return for their stars and b) that they’d develop those pitching prospects into major league contributors. And yes, there is a history of this.
Don’t let anyone fool you into believing that Bridich is running a different ship at 20th and Blake. He and his team have been with this organization for 10-plus years. They are just as much to blame for the Rockies failures over the last decade as anyone.
Trading away the core of this team would only deprive this town of watching really good baseball players. Would you rather watch Tulowitzki, Arenado, LeMahieu, Gonzalez and Dickerson lose 85-90 games or a bunch of no-name prospects fail to develop and lose 95-100? If you’d take the latter, you’re crazy.
At least with the cast of characters Colorado has now there is a chance something special could happen. That chance may only equate to a fraction of a percent but it’s still a chance.
Plus, all Bridich really does by moving stars for prospects is buy himself more time at the helm. He can play the “give the process time” card for three or four years while fans continue to slam their heads against a wall.
And, while “giving the process time,” rest assured that everyone would be asked to trust the drafting and development departments. Again, that’s a terrifying thought given the Rockies track record.
Nothing the Rockies do is going to breed change, that’s why it’s time to just throw in the towel. Who cares if they finish in the basement of the NL West? They have delicious Rio margaritas. Who cares if CarGo fans on another 3-2 slider out of the zone? The party deck in one of the best places to watch a sporting event in the state.
It’s time to not care about the Rockies when they are awful because that isn’t changing, everyone needs to accept that reality. It’s time to embrace being bandwagon Rockies fans because that’ll be a helluva lot more fun than getting mad at the never-ending disappointment of Rockies déjà vu.
