The last time Kyle Lohse pitched on a playoff stage, he gave up a crucial grand slam to Kaz Matsui in a 10-5 loss to the Rockies on October 4, 2007. His appearance for the Cardinals yesterday in the same park against Philadelphia didn't go any better, as the Phillies hit two HR's off Lohse and clobbered St. Louis, 11-6. The other time Lohse gave up a dinger in the playoffs was with the Twins in 2003 to the Yankees Hideki Matsui. In other games yesterday, both of the 1998 expansion teams that happen to have prouder histories (division titles, as many pennants, plus a World Series win for the D-backs) than the Rockies lost, and the Yankees won as Robinson Cano hit a grand slam off of former Rockeis farmhand Al Alburquerque.
Edgmer Escalona will be pitching for Los Leones del Caracas in Venezuela this winter after the Rockies reached an agreement with the Venezuelan Winter League club on restrictions to Escalona's workload.
Jim Armstrong hammers home the point that the Rockies are prioritizing pitching upgrades over offense this offseason, which I've argued that the priorities should be the reversed, as the Rockies are coming off a franchise record low water-mark in runs scored (not including the shortened 1994 strike season) and there's no help for that situation on the horizon, unless somebody really believes that Jordan Pacheco can make an immediate impact at third base or that Ian Stewart's career to date has been a fluke.
That said, I do recognize that there's a pitching need as well. The list of pitching possibilities Armstrong brings up this time, outside of Carl Pavano ---who would not constitute the upgrade the team seeks and who we've already gone over ad nauseam--- does look better this time around. Trading for either Ricky Nolasco or for Wade Davis could prove to be fairly significant additions. I believe Wandy Rodriguez would be too, but his salary leaves a much smaller margin for error than the other two.
To "prove" Armstrong's point, the Post goes on to use a chart showing Rockies starting pitcher losses since 2007. Yeah, so if we were going to go that direction, than it's pretty easy to point out that getting Pavano, who had 13 losses himself in 2011, and who is currently 21st among active MLB pitchers in losses, will do nothing to change that category for the Rockies in 2012, especially if he's going to be pitching without run support (Nolasco had 12 L's, Rodriguez 11 and Davis 10.) Of course, we cant' actually go that direction on Purple Row since we know pitcher losses are a meaningless stat. I'm guessing the Post knows it too, they just couldn't find anything better to prove their point.
Instead, I'm just going to point out the amount of runs the Rockies scored since that time, note that the two years the team went to the playoffs, the combination starts with a different digit than the other three times.
- 2007: 860
- 2008: 747
- 2009: 804
- 2010: 770
- 2011: 735
The past season has been bolded, because, no big deal, but it was record breaking as the worst ever in that category for the franchise. Not that fixing that should be a priority or anything.