Colorado Rockies shortstop Troy Tulowitzki is coming off of season-ending hip surgery after playing in only 91 games last season. The team's new general manager said earlier in the offseason he would entertain trade talks for the All-Star, and such discussions could begin to heat up after Wednesday.
Tulowitzki showed he's back and ready to go for 2015 after ripping an opposite field home run in the top of the first inning and then robbing Mariners' third baseman Kyle Seager of a single with a leaping grab at shortstop in the bottom half of the first. Check out the two highlights below:
General Manager Jeff Bridich didn't express any intent toward trading Tulowitzki (as well as outfielder Carlos Gonzalez), but the fact he was listening to offers proves he could at least be swayed. Earlier in the offseason sources believed a deal would not be made until the Rockies knew they could get maximum value for either of these two players once they returned to full health after their surgeries. Well, in his second spring training game, it appeared as if Tulowitzki was just fine.
"As long as I get out of here healthy, that's all I'm concerned about," the shortstop told Patrick Saunders of the Denver Post. "But it was a good day. ... It's only my second day, and I have a lot of work to do. Every game is a confidence booster."
However, Tulowitzki provides a bit of a dilemma for Colorado. For one, when he's healthy, he's easily the top shortstop in baseball, but he has averaged 88 games per season over the past three years and that's not going to help the team end its five-year postseason drought. Additionally, because the Rockies are a mid-market franchise ($99 million payroll in 2015), Tulowitzki's 10-year, $157 million contract is onerous if he's not playing, being that he'll be collecting $20 million in each of the next five seasons.
Tulowitzki's presence on the field is perhaps unrivaled, but the Rockies' ability to score runs is not the issue at hand. They finished third in the league last year in that category (even without him for 71 games) only behind the Los Angeles Angels and Detroit Tigers. Their pitching staff is clearly the problem, having ranked last in the league in ERA (4.84) and saves (24) and 29th in strikeouts (1,074) and opponents' batting average (.276).
The team does have a number of promising pitching prospects, but they won't be full developed to help the team contend in the next few years, especially in the NL West, which boasts the World Series champion San Francisco Giants as well as the new-look Dodgers, Padres and Diamondbacks.
"I do pay attention and I saw my name being thrown all over," Tulo said when asked about trade rumors just a few weeks ago. "I do know that rumors fly, and fly at a high rate nowadays with social media ... the Rockies kept me involved and I think they said that from the start ... I never listen to anything because I knew we would be communicating if anything came close."
It wouldn't be surprising if things started to come close in the coming weeks. All it takes is one team to have one of their top players to go down before trade rumors start swirling. After all, we saw what happened to pitchers Yu Darvish, Cliff Lee and Marcus Stroman in the past week, which goes to show wild things happen during spring training.
We can only speculate a deal will go down as Tulowitzki continues to prove he's healthy and capable of getting back to where he was in 2014.
