The 2014 Colorado Rockies: What to cheer against

Lance Iversen-USA TODAY Sports

The 2014 Colorado Rockies are often dubbed an “intriguing” team. An “interesting” team. A “team to watch.” But you know what people don’t call them?

A good team.

There is a common acknowledgment that if everything breaks right, the Rockies could be a dangerous team. Troy Tulowitzki and Carlos Gonzalez are two of the best 15 players in all of baseball. They just need to stay healthy. Jhoulys Chacin is solid. Jorge De La Rosa is a borderline ace. Brett Anderson can be an ace if he stays healthy. And on and on.

There’s a lot of ‘ifs’ and a lot of things that need to go right, probably too many to hope for realistically, which explains why the Rockies’ odds to win the World Series are 75/1.

There’s a lot to cheer for and a lot to cheer against. Here are some things to cheer against things in 2014.

Cheer against injury histories

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Let’s say it quickly and move on. Tulo, CarGo, and Brett Anderson are arguably the three most talented members of the Rockies. They are the guys who could push this team over the top.

All three tend to get hurt a lot. They need to not do that in 2014.

Cheer against bad platoon splits

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Drew Stubbs has a career .296 OBP against right-handed pitchers. Justin Morneau‘s career OPS against left-handed pitchers is .708 (and only declining in recent years). Both men have a good chance to be in the Rockies’ starting lineup on Opening Day.

Stubbs and Morneau both offer a ton of upside if they correct their issues against same-handed pitchers. That’s a huge if, so we probably shouldn’t get our hopes up. It should at least be noted, though, that the Rockies’s lineup would be scary good if both of these guys somehow clicked as everyday players.

Likely? Nope. But let’s cheer against those platoon splits anyway.

Cheer against being average

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Ultimately the problem for the Rockies is that they are in the dreaded middle ground of Major League Baseball. Things aren’t so hopeless that they feel the need to tear things down and start over, but they don’t really have realistic hopes of contending either. That has been bearing itself out with the recent Ervin Santana rumors. The Rockies aren’t so bad that it’s a ridiculous idea to sign him, but they aren’t contenders in a way that it makes sense to throw down the cheddar and the draft pick to go “all in” and pursue him.

Not all .500 seasons are created equal; it is acceptable when there is a sense of forward momentum. It is not acceptable when it just feels like another disappointing outcome. It is completely different for, say, the Houston Astros to go .500 than it is for the Rockies. The presence of guys like Michael Cuddyer, Justin Morneau, and Jorge De La Rosa, not to mention the contracts of Troy Tulowitzki and Carlos Gonzalez, create enough urgency to win now that crawling back up to an average .500 season does not feel like much of an accomplishment.

I am not going to go so far as to say that I want the Rockies to fail spectacularly if they aren’t going to be a playoff team, but we at least have to start questioning whether that would be a good thing or a bad thing at this point. The Rockies probably need to either win now or acknowledge the signals that this isn’t working and that they need to change course. Otherwise they will just keep running in place.