Chad Kuhl on joining the Colorado Rockies, “always liking” Denver

This offseason, the Colorado Rockies added more players than they have in any offseason in recent memory. One of those new faces has been Chad Kuhl, who started the season as Colorado’s fifth starter.

However, he has been their best starting pitcher thus far as, in his first three starts, he has a 1.10 ERA, a 2.77 FIP, and a WHIP of 0.918.

So, it stands to reason that Kuhl has made the transition to the Rockies easily and that has been the case.

Chad Kuhl has had an easy transition to the Colorado Rockies

“I’m surrounded by good people,” new Colorado Rockies starter Chad Kuhl told Rox Pile in an exclusive conversation this past weekend in Detroit. “They’ve made it super easy on me. Obviously, this is a (starting pitching) staff that has been together for a good while so they’re all familiar with each other. To fit in, they’ve been super welcoming.”

Unlike some of the other new faces with the Rockies, like Randal Grichuk or even Kris Bryant, Kuhl did not know many people at all when he was signed by the team.

One of them was Clint Hurdle. Hurdle was rehired by the Rockies as a special assistant to GM this past offseason after he was their manager from 2002 through 2009 and an MLB and MiLB coach with the team prior to that. Hurdle was Kuhl’s manager in Pittsburgh from 2016 through 2018 (Kuhl was injured in 2019, which was Hurdle’s final season there).

The other person was catcher Elias Díaz. Díaz was with the Pirates from 2015 through 2019. While with the Pirates, Díaz caught Kuhl 19 times in Pittsburgh overall in the majors.

That relationship was very helpful when joining the Rockies, according to Kuhl.

As for joining the Rockies, the most difficult thing for Kuhl hasn’t been with baseball. It’s just getting used to a new city.

“I think the most difficult thing is getting to know a new area,” Kuhl said. “I know Pittsburgh like the back of my hand, I knew all the in and outs of the travel, where to stay, and all of the stuff outside of baseball stuff. Getting to know what areas of Denver to rent a house or an apartment or traveling to different places (has been most difficult).”

With playing with the Pirates and being in the NL before joining the Rockies, he had been to Denver a few times and pitched there a few times as well.

“I always liked coming (to Denver) as a visitor,” Kuhl explained. “I’ve probably been there three or four times and they always seem to draw great crowds. The fans are always really good.”

Since he has been in Denver for only three weeks or so, he hasn’t had a ton of time to explore around Denver but he has explored it some and explored it by scooter.

“I haven’t really explored much (of the city) yet but I took a Lime scooter as far out as I could take one of those things and ran that around a bit,” Kuhl said. “The city has been nice, the ballpark is obviously beautiful, play in a good division, playing good ball, (and) the team is really good.”

Since then, though, the Rockies have hit a three-game skid in Philadelphia but they will return to the friendly confines of Coors Field tomorrow against the Cincinnati Reds. Kuhl is slated to make his fourth start of the season on Saturday where he will try to continue his great start to his career with the team.