...sounds crazy, no?
Tomoyuki Sugano finding success in the MLB despite not overthrowing or being an especially remarkable athlete is one of those complex stories you only get every so often. Remember, Jefry Yan, who jumps a mile high when he gets an out, will likely never make the bigs, but Sugano, even with his flaws, still stays dominant, even in a slightly different definition of dominance.
Fundamentally, Sugano is not Jacob Misiorowski. He's not even Parker Messick. He doesn't throw hard, he doesn't strike people out, and he doesn't go too deep. Sugano is an arsenal picture who keeps it in the park and goes by efficiency and trickery. He's 36 years old, and his fastball peaked in the 2010s in Japan. What he has left is intelligence and form, and that goes a long way. He's 8-4 so far this year, with a 4.80 ERA and 16 homers allowed. Now, in Denver of course he's gonna allow a lot of home runs, but he allowed 32 last year in Baltimore. Putting a leverage pitcher in Coors Field could be a recipe for disaster [as Michael Lorenzen could tell you], but Sugano keeps winning games and throwing strikes, and he still very much has a job in Denver. Will he get lit up? Yes, sometimes. But he's able to hold the Cubs to 3 runs, or the Pirates to 1 run, or the Reds scoreless. He doesn't get lit up terribly often, and even when he does he still finishes out the start. Just a consistent, steady, reliable guy playing for a team that needs something reliable.
Anyway, the Rockies are once again last in the MLB. Not as embarrassingly as last year, but it's still going pretty poorly. They've found a winning combo with Hunter Goodman and T.J. Rumfield, that's definitely the answer. And Kyle Karros, Willi Castro and Cole Carrigg are making decent progress. Carrigg at least has an .860 OPS in 16 games, and already has 11 RBIs, so there's not a ton of learning curve. Karros there sort of is a learning curve, it's taken him a bit to get going, but he's up to .250 and has decent contact perks, so that's a start. I also credit this team for finding great seasons from Jake McCarthy, Mickey Moniak and Troy Johnston. The rest of the lineup is painfully replacement level, including the once promising Ezequiel Tovar and the still-not-all-the-way-there Jordan Beck. Pitching-wise it's not much better. Feltner, Freeland and Lorenzen are all struggling. Dollander was doing well but got hurt. Sean Sullivan might be a decent rotation option if he played literally anywhere else. The bullpen's actually kinda okay but even Victor Vodnik's having a rough time out there.
It is nice to see success stories and signs of life, but it's still not an especially impressive full team effort, and it's not too much further than last year. Like, again...Tomoyuki Sugano is counted as a major success story here, with his 4.80 ERA. Maybe someday they can have a full squad capable of rising beyond replacement level novelty guys, but until then, that's gonna be what keeps the lights on sadly.
Coming Tomorrow- A guy about to suit up against my Yankees and hopefully this doesn't go as badly for my team as the last two nights.
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