Rockies GM Bill Schmidt non-committal about trade-deadline plans
Jun 17, 2023, 5:54 PM
Last year, as the Major League Baseball trade deadline approached, 29 of 30 teams made deals.
The Rockies were the outlier.
Every other team had a tangible direction — either pushing for immediate help to contend or adding assets to develop for future in the hopes of eventual contention. The Rockies stood pat, watching the traffic go by, declining to make a deal.
Ten-and-a-half months later, the Rockies sit in last place in the NL West. Only four clubs have worse records: Washington, St. Louis, Oakland and Kansas City.
And according to general manager Bill Schmidt, the Rockies have already had at least one call about a potential deal.
“I had one club back in May that was looking for pitching,” Schmidt said during an in-game interivew during the AT&T SportsNet Rocky Mountain coverage of the Rockies’ 10-2 loss in Atlanta on Saturday. “I said that was a little early for us.”
Heading into play Saturday, nine-and-a-half games and six teams separated the Rockies from the final wild-card spot. Saturday’s setback to the Braves — which guaranteed a series loss in the 4-game set — was Colorado’s 10th defeat in its last 13 games and 14th in 19 games since Memorial Day.
Still, the Rockies are “a few weeks away” from considering trades in advance of the Aug. 1 deadline, Schmidt said.
“First and foremost, try to get a feel (for) who’s going to be with us going forward. We do have some free agents,” Schmidt said on the broadcast.
Chief among those are first baseman C.J. Cron, DH Charlie Blackmon, first/third baseman Mike Moustakas, outfielders Randal Grichuk and Jurickson Profar and starting pitcher Chase Anderson, who has been stellar in six starts after being claimed last month when the Tampa Bay Rays designated him for assignment.
Cron and Blackmon are currently on the 10-day injured list. Anderson’s recent surge — and the potential paucity of quality pitching on the trade market — could make him an especially valuable trade piece.
“Needless to say, I think,” Schmidt said, pausing for nearly two seconds before continuing, “we have some players and pitchers that are going to attract some interest.”
“We’re really trying to determine who’s going to be part of our future going forward,” he added a moment later.
Schmidt also told AT&T SportsNet that generating opportunities for young players in the system would be a factor in any forthcoming decisions.
Now, it’s a question of what those decisions will be. Because as Geddy Lee sang four decades ago, “If you choose not to decide, you still have a made a choice.”
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