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Here’s what’s going on with the Colorado Rockies and the rest of Major League Baseball.
Rockies News & Links
Goodman’s goal for ’27: Help Rockies’ pitchers find every available edge | MLB.com
Somewhat lost amidst the pitching coach turnover has been the impact on the Rockies catching staff. In addition to the standard duties of preparing themselves to hit and field, catchers are also tasked with building a rapport their entire pitching staff. Hunter Goodman makes the case that he feels better about
his entire game when he is granted the opportunity call pitches rather than have them come from the dugout. This lends further credence to the idea that former pitching coach Alon Leichman was fired due to inability to get full team buy in for his vision of pitching strategy, which included dugout pitch suggestions.
The First Award of the Year: The Annual Vogelsong Awards | Baseball Prospectus ($)
Each year since 1996, Baseball Prospectus has published an enormous physical guide to the upcoming MLB season. This annual tome contains essays on every team as well as writeups on thousands of players. The Vogelsong awards are an attempt to recognize players that, despite not being deemed notable enough in the offseason to warrant a writeup in the annual, played exceptionally during the season. This season, BP tabbed Rockies rookie first baseman TJ Rumfield as the “clear-cut” winner of this award given his fabulous season and lack of representation in past annuals.
Rockies hire former big leaguer Andre Lipcius as video advance scout | Denver Post ($)
Rockies General Manager Josh Byrnes has brought in a former player that he worked with while with the Los Angeles Dodgers as a video advance scout. Andre Lipcius spent the 2024 season in the Dodgers minor-league season and impressed Byrnes so much that he was offered a coaching role as soon as his playing career ended this past season. The role itself is newly formed for the Rockies and will tie heavily into their game planning against the offenses of upcoming opponents.
Around MLB
MLB Issues Latest Proposal To MLBPA; Union Swiftly Rejects | MLB Trade Rumors
It took less than a full day for the MLBPA to emphatically reject the latest CBA proposal from MLB. Among other considerations, the proposal maintained the leagues top priority, a salary cap, but delayed it’s implementation by a year. The union wasted little time in making it clear that they will not accept this sort of structure. Barring a miraculous turnaround in negotiations, the current CBA expires in less than a month, and the league is expected to enact a lockout on December 1.
Athletics Hire Cam Castro As General Manager | Atheletics News
Another executive has been poached from the World Series champion Brewers front office. Cam Castro spent the past seven years with the Brewers in various roles starting as a minor league pitching coach and working his way all the way up to be their vice president of player development. Castro will serve as the second in command under Taylor Smith who was hired away from the Red Sox earlier this offseason to be the Athletics president of baseball operations.
Here are the rosters for Sunday’s AFL Fall Stars Game | MLB.com
The annual Fall Stars game, highlighting the best performers in the Arizona Fall League is set to take place this Sunday at 6 PM MST. The roster is always a fun assortment of the leagues best prospects alongside players that have previously had little national spotlight. This season the Rockies will be well represented with four prospects — Jared Thomas (No. 8 PuRP), Andy Perez (No. 25 PuRP), Jack O’Dowd (HM PuRP) and Fidel Ulloa — making the cut.
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