Welcome to the 2025 edition of Ranking the Rockies, where we take a look back at every player to log playing time for the Rockies in 2025. The purpose of this list is to provide a snapshot of the player in context.
The “Ranking” is an organizing principle that’s drawn from Baseball Reference’s WAR (rWAR). It’s not something the staff debated. We’ll begin with the player with the lowest rWAR and end up with the player with the highest.
No. 31, McCade Brown (-0.2 rWAR)
McCade Brown was drafted in the third round of the 2021 MLB Draft and like 12 other players, made his MLB debut in 2025. Specifically, the 6’ 6” right-hander made his debut on August 24 against the Pittsburgh Pirates, jumping from Double-A to the majors (likely because the Rockies were on the East Coast and needed a starter).
In his MLB debut, Brown lasted just 3 2/3 innings while allowing four runs on five hits with three walks and two strikeouts. He made seven starts with the Rockies — posting an 0-5 record and 7.36 ERA — and never had a clean game.
His worst start was his third, where he allowed six runs on five hits with a homer, two hit batters, a walk and a strikeout against the San Diego Padres. He only threw 44 pitches before being lifted.
However, his best start came on September 23 against the Seattle Mariners, where he lasted five innings and allowed just one run — a solo homer — with two walks and 10 strikeouts. It was also the night the Mariners officially clinched a postseason berth by winning 4-3, but Brown was lights out and showed promise, catching the eye of Rockies’ pitching coordinator Scott Oberg.
“One specific [highlight] would be seeing McCade Brown’s debut this year,” Oberg said during fall instructs in September.
“I was just proud of him in the sense from where he’d been a couple years ago,” he continued.
“I was doing Special Assistant work and seeing the guys go through the adversity of surgery and going through the rehab process and things like that. To see him pitch really well all season, continue to get better throughout the course of the season, and then be able to get up there. He outing that he had against Seattle where he struck out 10 over five [innings] — it’s that icing on the cake of ‘OK, this guy’s really good, and he can do it at that level.”
Brown, like many young pitchers, struggled with command at times. He never had a walk-free game, and only had one outing (his third, on September 6) in which he issued only one walk. Of his seven games, two were homer-less. He also recorded 13 strikeouts combined not on September 23. After posting a 34.3% strikeout rate in the minors in 2025, Brown struck out just 18.3% of batters while on the Rockies roster. His walk rate also went from 9.8% to 13.5%.
And like many other players, the Rockies will have to make a decision on whether or not they want to keep him and in what role. If he sticks around, Brown will likely start the season in Triple-A and begin to work his way back up again.
