TUCSON — Before retreating to the clubhouse after Monday’s game, Rockies center fielder Ryan Spilborghs offered encouragement to manager Clint Hurdle.
“Don’t worry, Skip,” he said. “We are setting them up.”
Six games into a back-to-basics approach, spring training has been a painful calisthenic. The Rockies are winless, hitting .219 and carrying a bloated 5.88 ERA. And they have made eight errors.
“We would like better results, but I am not real concerned,” Hurdle said.
The coaches and players explained that restrictions, in large part, are limiting their victories. The hitters and pitchers have been given specific rules to follow.
For the first five games, the hitters could not swing at the first strike. On Monday, the rule applied only to the leadoff hitter in each inning. But if any hitter swung at the first pitch, the next batter had to take a strike.
“We don’t have enough at-bats to get upset at anything right now,” said hitting instructor Don Baylor. “If there was a week left, that’s a different story.”
The idea from coaches is to eliminate quick-fire at-bats, which sabotaged last season’s offense and create a meat-grinder mind-set with runners on base.
“We have some things we have to obey that we might not even have during the regular season,” shortstop Troy Tulowitzki said. “You never want to lose games, but we are not in panic mode.”
Pitchers are not exempt from new spring training-only rules. They are under orders to throw almost exclusively fastballs down in the zone on both sides of the plate, a narrow game plan that will be gradually broadened. Predictably, it led to an ugly outing Monday. Franklin Morales and Jason Hirsh were tagged for 11 runs and 15 hits and issued five walks in 5 2/3 innings of the Rockies’ 12-3 loss to the Angels.
“I guarantee the (Angels) knew what we were doing because we had the same plan (Friday),” catcher Yorvit Torrealba said. “But you can’t take anything away from them for figuring it out. We have to do a better job locating our pitches.”
Troy E. Renck: 303-954-1301 or trenck@denverpost.com
RockiesRecap
At the plate: The Rockies were no-hit for 4 1/3 innings until Yorvit Torrealba laced a single to left field. Joe Koshansky tripled and now has an RBI in all four games he has started. Matt Murton drove in Koshansky with a homer to deep left.
On the mound: The fastball command that made Franklin Morales so impressive in his spring debut deserted him. The Angels rocked him for seven runs (five earned) in three innings, including three home runs.
In the field: Sloppy play continues to haunt the Rockies. Troy Tulowitzki’s error on a routine grounder at short led to two unearned runs in the second inning.
Up next
The Rockies play today in Phoenix against Milwaukee. Scheduled Rockies pitchers: Greg Smith, Alan Embree, Greg Reynolds and Ryan Mattheus.
Patrick Saunders, The Denver Post
