This Coors Lite stuff is getting out of control.
Yes, the humidor has changed the landscape and the stat lines in LoDo. But .162 at home in June? Or how about .197? Or seven home runs on the road and none at Coors?
It’s true. Ryan Spilborghs went into Monday hitting a buck-62 at home. Clint Barmes was at .197 before his two-run double in the second inning. Ian Stewart, meanwhile, has 13 extra-base hits on the road, including seven homers, and three at home, none of them long balls.
Todd Helton? We won’t even go there.
Rockies manager Jim Tracy has a strategy for dealing with all the struggles at home. It’s called sitting back and hoping things change.
“Let’s face it, we’re struggling offensively,” Tracy said. “I’m not going to skirt the issue. Yet we’ve been able to hold our own in the midst of it. Will we get to that (an offensive breakout)? Will it come to that? You have to think that, at some point in time, what it says on the back of people’s baseball cards, they seek and reach that level.”
And if it doesn’t happen?
“If not,” Tracy said, “we’re challenged every day.”
Mound matters.
How much progress is Jorge De La Rosa making in his rehab from a torn pulley tendon in his left middle finger? The Rockies may know more today after De La Rosa throws some breaking balls in the bullpen for the first time since being disabled in late April.
Said Tracy: “We’ll try to take his temperature a little bit and see where that’s all at.”
Movin’ on up.
Tracy was adamant that Helton, dropped to the six hole over the weekend, would return to the No. 3 spot if he can put his issues at the plate behind him.
“If someone gave me a choice today, I would really not want Todd to be there for too long,” Tracy said. “If Todd’s not there for too long, it’s very obvious that he started swinging it like he’s capable of and moves back into the spot where he becomes most effective for us.”
Footnotes.
Monday night’s series opener vs. Houston launched a stretch in which the Rockies have 13 home dates in 16 games. . . . The Rockies hit .114 (5-for-44) with runners in scoring position on their six-game trip to San Francisco and Arizona. . . . Tracy on Spilborghs: “Spilly’s swing looks much better to me than it did in the earlier part of the season. He’s obviously seeing the ball better.”
Jim Armstrong, The Denver Post
