Rockies starter Dakota Hudson was outrighted to Triple-A Albuquerque after clearing waivers, reports Thomas Harding of MLB.com (X link). Hudson has the right to elect free agency while retaining his $1.5MM base salary, but Harding suggests the right-hander is likely to report to Albuquerque.
Hudson signed a one-year free agent deal with Colorado after being non-tendered by the Cardinals. Colorado gave him 17 turns through the rotation, but Hudson didn’t manage particularly strong results. He posted a 5.84 earned run average with nearly as many walks as strikeouts. The sinkerballer induced ground-balls at a solid 52.4% clip, but the lack of missed bats didn’t play well at Coors Field.
A former supplemental first-round pick, Hudson had some productive years early in his career with St. Louis. His velocity has trended down over the past few seasons. His sinker is averaging a career-low 90.3 MPH this year. That squeezed Hudson off the roster and likely back to the minors. The Rox could field trade offers on Cal Quantrill and Austin Gomber, potentially opening a rotation spot or two after the deadline.
He showed a lot of promise early on and may still latch on to an organization where he finds success. 40 more wins than I’ll ever have!
There are some good pitchers out there that have lower velocity and don’t rely on 98 or 99 mph fastball like Sonny Gray, Shane Bieber, etc.
Hopefully Dakota can figure it out as well. I think Gray averages 7 to 10 strikeouts a game topping out at 93 mph.
Dakota Hudson is evidence that great groundball rates (89th precentile. 8th best GB% among pitchers with at least 60 IP) alone are not enough to succeed at Coors.
8.26 ERA in 9 home starts (yikes) as opposed to a 3.72 ERA in 8 away starts.
I think they probably also liked that he pitched like 140 innings and only gave up 9 HRs a couple of years ago. But he has also led the league in walks before (as he does this year) which is obviously not a recipe for success at Coors.
Although his career seemed to once point North, Dakota has since gone South.