Colorado Rockies: Antonio Senzatela returning to the rotation

During the upcoming series in Missouri against the Kansas City Royals, Rockies rookie right-handed pitcher Antonio Senzatela will be returning to the starting rotation for the first time since August 9 against the Cleveland Indians. Senzatela, though, has not made back-to-back starts since July 18 and 24 and three straight starts since June 11, 16, and 22.

Rockies rookie right-handed pitcher Antonio Senzatela will be returning to the starting rotation on Wednesday in game two of the the three game series with the Kansas City Royals after only making one start since June 22.

However, according to Nick Groke of the Denver Post in this article, Senzatela will have some changes in his repertoire: changing the grip on his slider and adding a curveball.

His current repertoire is compiled of a four-seam fastball, sinker, slider, and changeup (as you can see here at BrooksBaseball.net). Groke talked to Rockies manager Bud Black and he had this to say about Senzatela’s curveball:

"“A new pitch doesn’t truly happen over night,” Black said. “I’m a tough judge on what I think is a good pitch. He might spit one out and you go, ‘Wow that was a good pitch.’ But what about the next 100 he throws? Give me a big sample, a period of time where I can really see the results and then we can comment on a new pitch.”"

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As Groke said, the Rockies want Senzatela to use his off-speed and breaking pitches more to make it more difficult against his opponents.

Before this month, according to Brooks Baseball, he used his fastball between 70.07 and 77.62 percent of the time in each month so it’s not surprising to see why the Rockies want him to mix it up a bit.

For reference, since the return from his injury, Jon Gray has used his fastball between 53.5 and 62.33 percent of the time and Tyler Chatwood has used his fastball between 26.98 and 39.08 percent before this month.

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We will discuss Senzatela, among other things, a bit more in our series preview between the Rockies and Royals tomorrow morning before the start of the series at 6:15 MST.