Colorado Rockies decline qualifying offers on all of their free agents

Colorado Rockies general manager Jeff Bridich held a conference call at 11:30 a.m. (Mountain time) on Friday and he announced during that call that the Rockies will not extend a qualifying offer to any of their five impending free agents.

The qualifying offer deadline is on Friday at 5 p.m. Eastern (3 p.m. Mountain) and before the deadline, Colorado Rockies GM Jeff Bridich announced in a conference call this morning that the Rockies will not extend that qualifying offer to any of their free agents.

The team has five free agents, including Carlos Gonzalez, Adam Ottavino, DJ LeMahieu, Santiago Casilla, and Drew Butera.

The only three players that may have been under consideration for the offer were Gonzalez, Ottavino, and LeMahieu.

However, with the qualifying offer being $17.9 million this offseason, all three players still would have had at least a 52 percent raise in salary in 2019. Gonzalez did take a 75 percent pay cut for the 2018 season as he only made $5 million in 2018 after making $20 million in 2017.

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For Ottavino and LeMahieu, I would personally expect them to make somewhere between $10 million and $15 million per year on the open market and, for Gonzalez, I would expect him to make somewhere between $5 and $8 million.

During the conference call, Bridich spoke on his philosophy on the qualifying offer, as well. He said that in determining in whether or not the team would extend a qualifying offer to any of the five players, their decision will vary on year by year basis depending on “the landscape of the rest of the roster…the free agent market and the potential trade markets that are upcoming.”

With the salaries of the impending free agents, looking at what they would likely get on the open market for one season, and the needs that the Rockies have on their roster, it is easy to see why the Rockies did not extend the offer to any of the three that may have been under consideration for it.

Bridich later did say that he plans on addressing the offense and they are having “positive” conversations with Nolan Arenado on a possible extension.

After all, when you have one player at the top of the depth chart in two different positions, you obviously have at least one hole to fill.

For the Rockies, that is with David Dahl as he is at the top of the depth chart in both left field and right field on MLB.com. That is obviously an issue that must be addressed before the offseason is over.