The Rockies are wrapping their fouth straight losing season, yet the organization hasn’t felt compelled to make a change in the dugout. General manager Bill Schmidt told reporters (including The Athletic’s Nick Groke) today that manager Bud Black will return for the 2023 season, saying that “Buddy came here right when we were ready to be good. He led us to some playoffs. He’s very capable of doing it again. It’s not for lack of effort.”
Black’s first two seasons in Colorado indeed resulted in postseason appearances. The Rockies earned wild-card berths in both 2017 and 2018, and in the latter season defeated the Cubs in the Wild Card Game to advanced to the NLDS (where the Brewers eliminated the Rox in a sweep). Since those two playoff berths, however, the Rockies have yet to reach the .500 mark, and Black has a 414-445 overall record as he approaches the end of his sixth season as Colorado’s skipper.
The two wild-card berths earned Black a contract extension prior to the 2019 season, a three-year deal that ran from 2020-22. The Rockies added another year of control in another contract extension last February, with Black extended for a one-year deal that runs through the 2023 campaign. The relatively limited nature of that extension seemed to indicate that Black was on a slightly shorter leash, yet it doesn’t appear to have hampered his job security.
In fact, Groke notes that Black is “on a rolling year-to-year contract” that would seemingly give both sides the flexibility to walk away after any season, not that such a scenario seems likely in the near future. It would seem like Black’s arrangement could be similar to the so-called handshake deal that the Rockies had with former manager Jim Tracy, wherein Tracy had the freedom to leave at the end of any season.
Rockies owner Dick Monfort is known to value loyalty and continuity within his organization, which has proven to be a double-edged sword considering that the Rockies are often criticized for being too insular. The change from Jeff Bridich to Schmidt (another long-time front office employee) in the GM chair last season didn’t do anything to get Colorado on track in 2022, and a lot of work will need to be done to make the team a winner in 2023. Virtually every member of the Rox roster had an underwhelming season either at the plate or on the mound, and prized free agent signing Kris Bryant ended up spending most of the year on the injured list.
With all this in mind, it is somewhat difficult to really evaluate Black’s win-loss record. For as much as Monfort and company perpetually feel that the Rockies are on the verge of contention, Black doesn’t seem to be receiving much of the blame for not winning with these flawed rosters. While it can also be argued that Black isn’t necessarily part of a solution to the Rockies’ woes, Colorado’s bigger-picture issues in evaluating, developing, and acquiring talent seem like much larger obstacles to success than Black’s work as manager.
He’s not terrible. It is extremely difficult to manage a MLB game in that stadium.
Keep using the stadium as a reason for their failure. Everyone has to play there.
That being said, I have no issues with Bud Black. I just find it annoying how everyone blames Coors Field when the team has never had a reliable #1 starter in the last fifteen years
Stop making excuses for soft failures that we keep around as managers. What’s the definition of insanity, said Einstein?
Viny Castilla
Joe Girardi
Either one of these fresh minds would do. Girardi knows how to manage pitching. BB clearly does not.
Bud Black was a good manager about 10 years ago.
Not really
Not his fault the owner and FO can’t pull their heads out of their sphincters and build a team that doesn’t suck.
Padre fans would disagree. BB is creatively dead. Defunct. He knows it and is too selfish to step down from the game.
Someone asked a question in the most recent PHR mailbag about who gets the ‘Definition of Insanity’ award, AKA the ‘Colorado Rockies Award.’
I get that you can’t fully blame Black for all of this, but if ever there was a team dying for something, anything different, it’s this team.
A whole new owner would be a great start.
Gray clouds rolling over Colorado today. No hope. Sad.
I am happy with this. But I am a long time Rockies fan, I remember when we hired Walt Weiss away from a high school team to manage the club. So anything to get a good manager to stay is positive. Bud Black is one of the best on field managers in the game. But even Connie Mack in his prime couldn’t do anything with this group.
You ought to do a little research before you crap on the Rox hiring “Weiss away from a high school team.” He was a former SS for them as well as being an instructor and a special assistant to the GM from 2002-2008. He left his MLB job to coach high school so he could coach his sons. In 2012, the Rox began talking to him about this thoughts on a managerial hire. They were so impressed w/him that he was hired. He had tons of baseball experience, and a long history w/the Rox. Read his bio at the Society for American Baseball Research. Solid baseball man, even better person.
Really? Weiss was a former SS. Jeez I had no idea. I have only been watching the Rockies from day 1 and was a baseball fan for 10 years prior to their starting. But please, tell me all about him since you read a one page essay on him.
I don’t care if he was Mother Teresa. The point is that he was coaching a HS team and had no managerial experience at any professional level when he was hired to manage a big league ball club.
If your qualification for baseball expertise is how long you’ve been watching the Rox, I can compare my Braves fandom since I was 9 years old in 1966 (year they moved to Atlanta) w/yours. I don’t claim to be more knowledgeable than you just because I’ve watched it for 15 years longer than you. Having no managerial experience at any professional level hasn’t stopped a lot of former ML players from receiving managerial positions. Weiss was coaching his sons high school team so he could be involved in their lives. Not like he sought managing gigs and a HS position was all he could find.
If someone has never done a specific job before, they can never be successful in said job. Makes sense.
Not his fault the Rockies can’t build a team. Might as well draw the paycheck and say you did everything you could. Must be a sweet gig to work knowing expectations aren’t ever that high from year-to-year.
Black is the only one in management who has a clue, without him they lose 100.
Outside of maybe the Angels i don’t see a job for Black that offers him anything better than what he already has.
Not a bad idea…We’ll take him! He has the blood of 2002 in him. Let’s do it.
And I know that Maddon did too. Didn’t have much against him. But I think Black would be a great fit.
There’s no excuse for this. Stop playing for mediocrity Colorado. The fans deserve better than banking on guys that shouldn’t have been extended, not called up, rewarded for their performances only to pay them based on aging and a complete and total disregard towards your own minor league system. Now Buddy Black is getting retained after 4 straight losing seasons when the team has actively contended throughout. Why not just roll out the red carpet and give this guy the Mike Hampton treatment. Did this team forget they are in the same division as The Dodgers, San Diego, and heck San Francisco for that matter. No single organization in Baseball needs a complete 100% overall top to bottom than colorado because it’s clearly not working and will not going forward and all of this is coming from a Pirates fan that sees their team making the steps that need to happen all while dealing with the most penny pinching owner in Baseball. Pathetic.
Big money to Desmond, Bryant, and other position players. Pitching is not a concern to Colorado Braintrust. No scouting for good strong outfield arms for the future. No core team that plays 2 of 3 games. No solidarity with the team. Relief pitchers never earn designated roles in the BP. Starting rotation lacks definition, competitive comradery. Bud Black knows how to lose games all too well. It’s no wonder why good players don’t want to stay on with this program which is not much of one. Zero game plan. See 2014 KC Royals on the offensive game plan and developing role designation in the BP. Bud Black should simply be given parting money. Who wants another crap season?
They should have announced it with AC/DC’s Back in Black opening the press conference
Can’t remember the last time that franchise had any direction.
They go in circles with the rebuilding – youth movement / not rebuilding – playing veteran guys that aren’t going to take that team anywhere.
It’ seems like they’ve accepted what they’re: a so-so team that gives the fans of Denver a place to go for some high-priced entertainment a couple of times in the summer, and something for local sports fans to sort of kick around between seasons of the Nuggets / Avalanche and Broncos. Colorado is a cold weather area and the fans seem to react better to the cold weather sports.
When are the Rockies going to name Vida Blue as pitching coach?
He is the only one in management that has a clue, without him they easily lose 100.
Clearly, BB has not motivated his players to win on the field. The Rockies’ poor road record suggests the lack of player cohesion and solidarity amongst adversity. I call for BB to be released and replaced by somebody who can either manage pitching (Girardi), or generate enthusiasm by modeling his own (Viny Castilla). Bud Black says that he wants to be part of the solution to the Rockies … when he is a chief component of the collective problem with the Rockies. He needs to be released or else step down for the sake of the franchise.