Colorado Rockies: Top Five Third Basemen in Franchise History

Third base has been one of the strongest positions in Colorado Rockies franchise history.

For the Colorado Rockies, third base has been a strong point on most of their teams. That is mainly because of the play of two guys for nearly half of the franchise’s history.

If you are a current fan of the Rockies and one that knows some history, you can probably guess the top two players on the list are going to be but the other three may be a bit surprising depending on how well you remember the Rockies third basemen of yesteryear.

Let’s take a look back down memory lane and for number five, we will have to back all the way to the first third baseman of the Rockies.

Number 5: Charlie Hayes (4.1 bWAR, 4.8 fWAR, 2 years as a Rockie)

Charlie Hayes spent two of his 14 year MLB career with the Rockies and his best MLB season came as a Rockie. In the Rockies’ inaugural season of 1993, Hayes was in his age-28 season and he was, by OPS+, the Rockies second-best hitter, behind first baseman Andres Galarraga.

In 157 games, Hayes hit .305/.355/.522 with 25 home runs, 98 RBI, an NL leading 45 doubles, and an OPS+ of 118. He played to a 3.3 bWAR/3.9 fWAR that season.

He regressed a bit in 1994 as during the strike-shortened season, he hit .288/.348/.433 with 10 home runs, 50 RBI, 23 doubles, and an OPS+ of 90 in 113 games. He played to a 0.8 bWAR/0.9 fWAR.

The Rockies got Hayes from the New York Yankees in the 1992 expansion draft and after the 1994 season, he left the Rockies in free agency. He went to Philadelphia for the second stint of his MLB career. He later signed with Pittsburgh and was traded to the Yankees (for his second tenure there) in 1996. He helped the Yankees win the World Series in 1996 as he caught the final out in foul territory at third base to win the World Series.

He bounced around to a few other teams before last playing with Houston in 2001.

Number 4: Garrett Atkins (5.3 bWAR, 7.6 fWAR, parts of 7 years as a Rockie)

Garrett Atkins is a bit hard to rank considering that his best seasons were really great but he dropped like a lead balloon. He also only spent four of the seven seasons as primary third baseman. In the other three seasons, Atkins accumulated -2.3 bWAR/-1.8 fWAR so that’s obviously not what got him on this list. But in the other four seasons (the four main seasons that he was the primary third baseman), he had 7.3 bWAR/9.5 fWAR.

Here’s look at his overall stats from his Rockies tenure.

Of the four primary seasons, two stand out offensively: 2006 and 2007. However, his fielding is what has the big differentiation in WAR between FanGraphs and Baseball-Reference.

By WAR, his best two seasons were 2005 and 2006 per Baseball-Reference but FanGraphs says that his best two seasons were 2006 and 2007.

Both sites are in agreement, though, that he was awful defensively in 2007 as he has -26 DRS from both sites.

His peak would have him at number three but considering his rise and fall was so quick and dramatic, he is at number four.

Number 3: Jeff Cirillo (7.9 bWAR, 6.9 fWAR, 2 seasons as Rockie)

Like Charlie Hayes, Jeff Cirillo spent only two of his 14 year MLB career with the Rockies and he bounced around to a few different teams, particularly after he left the Rockies.

The Rockies acquired Cirillo in Dealin’ Dan O’Dowd’s first offseason as Rockies GM as he was hired in September of ’99 and Cirillo was acquired in December of ’99.

It was a three-team trade that looked like this:

It was O’Dowd’s second trade of the day involving third basemen on our list as someone coming up on our list was traded away on the same day. These would be the Rockies’ last two trades of the 20th century and the Millenium. They were also O’Dowd’s 5th and 6th trades of the offseason (that’s why he was nicknamed Dealin’ Dan).

Cirillo was an All-Star in his first season as Rockie as he also had a great bat for contact and driving in runs. However, he hit for little power.

In 2000, he had 195 hits, 111 runs, 115 RBI, 53 doubles, and a batting average and on-base percentage of .326 and .392. He also walked nearly as often as he struck out (67 walks and only 72 strikeouts). However, with those 115 RBI, he had an astonishingly low 11 home runs and, therefore, a .477 slugging percentage and an OPS+ below league average (99).

In 2001, he hit .313/.364/.473 with 17 home runs, 83 RBI, 26 doubles, and an OPS+ of 98. His WAR in the two seasons is pretty good because defensively, he was very good. Per FanGraphs, he had 29 TZ (Total Zone rating, which is the predecessor to Defensive Runs Saved, which started to be calculated in 2003) in his two seasons as a Rockie.

Dealin’ Dan dealt Cirillo to the Mariners after the 2001 season for Jose Paniagua, Denny Stark, and a guy by the name of Brian Fuentes so it ended up being a pretty good deal for the Rockies.

That trade and the trade that brought Cirillo to the Rockies will be part of an investigation that we will have here at Rox Pile in the next few days so stay tuned for that soon.

Number 2: Vinny Castilla (17.5 bWAR, 15.7 fWAR, parts of 9 seasons as a Rockie)

Vinny Castilla was an original Colorado Rockie, like Charlie Hayes, but at first, he played shortstop for the Rockies in 1993. He was mainly relegated to the bench in 1994 due to the acquisition of Walt Weiss to play shortstop.

When Hayes left after 1994, though, the Rockies turned to Castilla to replace him. Obviously, that ended up being an excellent decision for the Rockies and great for Castilla. The Rockies moved to Coors Field that season and along with Larry Walker, Dante Bichette, Andres Galarraga, and Ellis Burks, Castilla became a part of the Blake Street Bombers.

In 1995, he hit 32 home runs and 90 RBI with an OPS+ of 113. He also became an All-Star for the first time, came in 18th in NL MVP voting, and won an NL Silver Slugger Award.

In the next four seasons, Castilla averaged 40 home runs, 118 RBI, and a slash line of .301/.348/.541. In those four seasons, he was an All-Star once more, won two Silver Slugger Awards, and ranked twice in NL MVP voting.

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Dealin’ Dan O’Dowd traded Castilla to the Tampa Bay Devil Rays for Rolando Arrojo and Aaron Ledesma on the same day he acquired Jeff Cirillo from Milwaukee to replace him.

Castilla suffered knee injuries in Tampa due to the turf playing surface so they traded him to Houston and later, Castilla played for the Braves but he hadn’t returned to his former ways.

He returned to the Rockies in 2004 where he returned to his former glory as he hit 35 home runs and had a league-leading 131 RBI along with a slash line of .271/.332/.535 and an OPS+ of 109. He came in 22nd in NL MVP voting. It was the first time he had an OPS+ above 100 for a full season or 100+ RBI in a season since he had left the Rockies.

He left the Rockies again but this time, via free agency. He went to the Nationals (for their first season in Washington, D.C.) and the Padres before returning to the Rockies for a third time in late 2006, where he finished out his career.

Now, he is a special assistant with the Rockies front office and also helps with occasional coaching. He also was part of Kingsford’s Taste of the Game cookbook with recipes from players of each of the 30 teams. We talked to him exclusively in a conversation about that, his baseball career, what he’s doing now, and what may be in store for him in the future. You can read here.