Colorado Rockies: What Jeff Hoffman’s injury means for him

On Sunday, Colorado Rockies pitcher Jeff Hoffman was scratched from his scheduled appearance due to shoulder issues. However, with the injury, it may not bode well for him by the end of spring training.

Jeff Hoffman was scratched from his scheduled appearance on Sunday due to lingering shoulder issues.

Rockies manager Bud Black spoke to the media on Monday, including our very own Kevin Henry, about Hoffman’s recovery, among other things, and Kevin asked him how Hoffman was doing.

Black said that Hoffman was “a little better than he was yesterday and he’ll be doing a little better tomorrow than he is today.” Black added that they will “have him on a little bit of a slow program here [in the] next couple of days” and that he thinks that Hoffman will not see any game action for “a week to ten days”.

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Black also admitted that the injury hinders his chances at getting a starting rotation spot. This is partially because he’ll be out of game action for a while and also, since it’s still early, he will probably have to ramp back up to where he was so that will probably have to start from scratch and be much further behind than the other starters.

Personally, I think that he would be on the outside looking in even if he was healthy as the Rockies have about seven guys competing for the five rotation spots (more on that tomorrow). With the injury, I think that the writing is on the wall that Hoffman will not be in the Rockies starting rotation on opening day.

Also, Hoffman still has two minor league options so he can very easily be optioned to the minors. In addition, he had the highest ERA of anybody who made a start for the Rockies last year and he had the highest ERA of anybody who pitched than four games other than the albatross of a season that Jordan Lyles had before he was released by the Rockies so it could easily be argued that he needs more minor league seasoning anyways.

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Either way, I personally think that Hoffman, especially with the injury, will not be making the Rockies opening day rotation.