An Open Letter to Jim Tracy

Dear Mr. Tracy,

Thank you for taking time out of your day to read my pathetic ramblings on baseball. I don’t usually do this sort of thing, so pardon me if it is lacking a certain “je ne sais quoi.”

While I’m sure the Rockies’ upper management is a fan of yours, fans love you dearly for 2009’s run, and your players respect you, I have a lot of problems with the way you ran your team during the 2010 season. Let me list a couple of them for you:

1. Miguel Olivo and the Catcher position
I mean, hey, no one can blame you for playing Olivo during his super hot first half, or sending Iannetta down to get him regular playing time, but it never should have gotten that far to begin with.

First, I’m sure you hate strikeouts. Did you know that Miguel struck out more often than Chris did? Yeah, it sort of surprised me, too. Did you know that Chris also walked more and is a better power hitter? Because I sure did. And yeah, Olivo probably did a better job of handling your pitching staff, but can that really make up for his offensive short comings? Come on Jimmy (can I call you Jimmy? I’m going to call you Jimmy), I think you know better.

2. Eric Young, Jr.
EY Jr. is one fast dude, isn’t he? I’m not going to sit here and list off various metrics for you Jimmy, I’m just going to try to plant an idea in your brain: Think how scary a lineup that included EY, Carlos Gonzalez and Dexter Fowler would be! Opposing catchers wouldn’t be able to do a darn thing against your barrage of “the quickness.”

In Conclusion
All of these problems are correctable, Jimmy T, so I’d really appreciate it if you’d take my suggestions under advisement and make the necessary changes to your approach next year. Rockies fans, and baseball fans everywhere, would love you for it.

Thanks a boatload,

Zach Sanders