News Flash: the Rockies have hit an all time low
“Well, folks, it’s mid May, and not only has it gotten REALLY bad, I’d say it’s reached an all time low. And that’s saying a lot considering the Rockies organization has seen its fair share of crippling lows.”
I asked a few smart baseball people at the beginning of the Rockies season if things got really bad in the month of May, would Jim Tracy be fired despite his lifetime, hand shake contract he was given. Surprisingly, no one really thought so. They felt it would have to get REALLY bad and even then, he may make it though the season.
Well, folks, it’s mid May, and not only has it gotten REALLY bad, I’d say it’s reached an all time low. And that’s saying a lot considering the Rockies organization has seen its fair share of crippling lows. And if someone isn’t fired soon, whether it’s Jim Tracy, Bob Abazabba or Carney Lansford, the revolt will be on.
When the Josh McDaniels era reached critical mass after the heinous defeat at the hands of the Oakland Raiders, fans had had enough. They screamed and yelled up to that point, but until talk turned to not buying tickets, Pat Bowlen had stayed the course. And when he couldn’t risk alienated his fan base any longer, he pulled the plug.
The Rockies are about to lose their iron grip on the fan base they’ve wrung like a sponge since 1993. The people are still coming out on a nice day to sit in the ball park, but that number will dwindle dramatically in the next couple of weeks while the Rockies stay the course. Because the horrendous product the Monforts and Dan O’dowd have trotted out onto the filed night after night, and the best weather in the world won’t help fill Coors Field in the coming weeks.
The team started to blow it last year when, after signing Troy Tulowitizki and Carlos Gonzalez to contracts that made everyone think we were set sailing with a perennial playoff powerhouse, the team stumbled badly down the stretch and didn’t make the postseason. At the time it seemed like a bump in the road, but looming on the horizon was a bump the size of an iceberg: if they repeated the same piss-poor performance the next season – or god forbid, early in the season – all that good will cultivated before that would dry up like a dog turd in the sun. And what dried dog turd this team has become: We knew the pitching was probably going to stink, but the defense has been a shadow of its former self (Tulo) and for the offense to be this bad is just an insult to the people who do buy the tickets.
You never want anyone to lose their job. But when the level of incompetence the team and its management have shown are soon matched by the level of ill will emanating from the fans, it’s time that heads started rolling. It’s never a quick fix, and it may not change anything with the team, but for how bad it’s gotten and how low the morale of the fans has sunk, it just has to be done.
