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Rockies Recall Greg Jones For MLB Debut

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2:00pm: The Rockies have now made the official announcement, recalling Jones and Toglia while placing both Bryant and Bouchard on the 10-day IL. Bryant’s ailment is listed as a left rib contusion while Bouchard’s is a right ankle sprain.

1:08pm: The Rockies are set to recall infielder/outfielder Greg Jones from Triple-A Albuquerque for what’ll be his major league debut, reports Thomas Harding of MLB.com. Jones is already with the club in St. Louis, and the Rockies appear set to place not only Kris Bryant (as reported yesterday) but also fellow outfielder Sean Bouchard on the injured list. Harding notes that Bouchard, who exited last night’s game with an apparent foot or ankle injury after running out a sacrifice bunt (video link), was on crutches in the clubhouse prior to the game.

Acquired from the Rays in a spring training trade sending pitching prospect Joe Rock to Tampa Bay, the 26-year-old Jones was the No. 22 overall pick in the 2019 draft. After impressing with a 2019 run in Low-A and a 2021 run in High-A, his bat stalled out in Double-A and Triple-A, however, and his prospect stock tumbled accordingly. Jones had a rebound last year when he slashed .278/.344/.467 in a hitter-friendly Triple-A setting (101 wRC+), which was enough to pique Colorado’s interest and bring about that offseason swap.

While Jones spent about a month on the injured list this season, he’s gotten into 20 Triple-A games and taken 89 plate appearances, batting .240/.360/.387 with a hefty 12.4% walk rate against an also sizable 28.1% strikeout rate. Jones has popped two home runs and, despite his limited time on the field, already swiped 15 bases in 16 attempts. He’s played both shortstop and center field in Albuquerque this year, spending more time at the latter of the two.

Strikeouts have been an issue for Jones throughout his minor league tenure, but scouting reports have credited him as a 70- or even 80-grade runner with a plus arm and huge athleticism. Injuries have regularly kept him off the field though, and paired with the lost minor league season in 2020, Jones has just 293 professional games despite being drafted nearly five years ago.

Those roadblocks in his development have left him rougher around the edges than most 26-year-old minor leaguers, but there’s a clear collection of impressive tools in his skill set if he can eventually hone his bat-to-ball skills with more reps. Doing so at the game’s top level will be a challenge in and of itself, but with Bouchard and Bryant likely headed to the IL alongside outfielders Nolan Jones and Jordan Beck, the Rockies aren’t exactly teeming with outfield options. Michael Toglia is already expected to take Bryant’s spot on the big league club, and Jones is the only other outfielder on Colorado’s 40-man roster.

Rockies To Select Alan Trejo

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Utility infielder Alan Trejo has made the Rockies’ Opening Day roster, manager Bud Black announced this morning (X link via Patrick Saunders of the Denver Post). He’s a non-roster invitee in camp and will thus need to be selected to the 40-man roster. Colorado has a full 40-man at the moment. Left-hander Lucas Gilbreath is recovering from Tommy John surgery performed in March of 2023 and could be a 60-day IL candidate. Otherwise, the Rox will likely need to free up a spot by way of a DFA.

Black also announced that first baseman/outfielder Michael Toglia has made Colorado’s roster. Outfielder Sean Bouchard has been optioned to Triple-A Albuquerque to begin the season. Toglia figures to step in as the team’s primary right fielder, as first base will be occupied by Kris Bryant in 2024.

Trejo, 27, has appeared in the majors with the Rockies in each of the past three seasons. He’s logged 402 plate appearances and put together a .243/.292/.367 slash (65 wRC+) with nine homers, 19 doubles, six steals (in nine tries), a 6% walk rate and a 24.1% strikeout rate. He’s been far better in Triple-A, evidenced by a .292/.338/.261 slash in 710 plate appearances there, and he’s had a decent performance this spring: .244/.327/.488, three homers in 49 trips to the plate.

Defensively, Trejo has played each of second base, shortstop and third base. Both Defensive Runs Saved and Outs Above Average grade him as a sharp defender at second base and third base but a sub-par option at shortstop. Trejo should serve as a backup for second baseman Brendan Rodgers, shortstop Ezequiel Tovar and third baseman Ryan McMahon. He’s a right-handed hitter who’s been far better against fellow righties than against lefties to this point in his still fairly young career.

Trejo is out of minor league options, so if the Rockies wish to make a change at any point, they’ll need to designate him for assignment. He can’t be sent down to the minors without first clearing waivers. That’s true of Colorado’s entire bench, in fact. Backup catcher Jacob Stallings has enough service time that he can’t be optioned without his consent, and none of Trejo, corner infielder/DH Elehuris Montero, or newly acquired outfielder/first baseman Jake Cave have minor league options remaining.

As for Toglia, he turned in a hefty .259/.333/.593 slash and clubbed five homers in 60 spring plate appearances. That performance came with at least one notable red flag, as he also went down on strikes in 31.7% of his plate appearances, but it was enough to beat out the 27-year-old Bouchard, who hit just .205/.308/.341 in a similar amount of playing time this spring. Toglia will join center fielder Brenton Doyle and left fielder Nolan Jones in the Rockies outfield most days.

The 25-year-old Toglia was the No. 23 overall pick by the Rockies back in 2019. He’s never drawn the sort of top-100 fanfare many other first-round picks garner but has long ranked as one of the better prospects in a thin Rockies system — climbing as high as No. 2 on Baseball America’s rankings two offseasons ago. Toglia hasn’t hit well in the majors in either 2022 or 2023, with just a .187/.246/.325 slash and 34.6% strikeout rate through 272 plate appearances. He’s been a fine hitter in the upper minors, but scouts have questioned his hit tool throughout his pro career, even as his plus raw power has been on display (e.g. a 32-homer season in 2022).

Rockies Select Cole Tucker, Designate Coco Montes For Assignment

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The Rockies announced that they have selected the contract of infielder/outfielder Cole Tucker, with first baseman/outfielder Michael Toglia optioned to Triple-A Albuquerque in a corresponding move. To open a spot for Tucker on the 40-man, infielder Coco Montes was designated for assignment.

Tucker, 27, signed a minor league deal with the Rockies in the offseason. He was added to the big league roster last month but was designated for assignment just one week later, having taken just eight plate appearances over three games. He was outrighted to Albuquerque after clearing waivers and could have rejected that assignment based on having a previous career outright, but accepted and is now back with the big league club.

Around that brief stint in the majors, he’s taken 321 trips to the plate in 70 Triple-A games. He walked in 15.3% of those, leading to a batting line of .280/.391/.407 and 101 wRC+. Once a highly-touted prospect with the Pirates, he’s hit just .214/.263/.316 in 477 major league plate appearances thus far. At the very least, he should provide the Rox with defensive versatility, having played each infield and outfield position in his career. He can be controlled for four more seasons beyond this one but is out of options.

Montes, 26, hit .321/.401/.560 through his first 59 Triple-A games this year and got selected to the big league roster in June. But he then hit just .184/.244/.316 in his first 41 plate appearances at the major league level and has now been bounced from the roster.

Since the trade deadline has passed, the Rockies will place Montes on waivers in the coming days. His first taste of the majors didn’t go well but he’s generally produced solid numbers in the minors and spent significant time at the three infield positions to the left of first base. He will still have two option years beyond this one and has less than a year of service time.

Rockies Select Fernando Abad, Place C.J. Cron On IL

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The Rockies announced they’ve selected the contract of left-hander Fernando Abad and recalled infielder/outfielder Michael Toglia from Triple-A Albuquerque. In corresponding moves, first baseman C.J. Cron was placed on the 10-day injured list while right-hander Nick Mears was placed on the 15-day IL, retroactive to May 12, due to a left oblique strain. There was already a vacancy on the club’s 40-man roster for Abad, meaning no corresponding move will be necessary in that regard.

Abad gets back to the big leagues for the first time in two years. The veteran southpaw signed a minor league deal over the winter after spending 2022 in Triple-A with the Mariners. He went to Albuquerque and has performed exceptionally well in one of affiliated ball’s toughest parks for pitchers. Abad has thrown 16 innings of three-run ball, fanning 20 hitters while walking just a pair.

Now 37, Abad has pitched in parts of 10 big league campaigns. He carries a 3.77 ERA over 348 1/3 innings, striking out a below-average 19.6% of opposing hitters but keeping his walks to a reasonable 8.3% clip. He joins Brent Suter and Brad Hand as veteran left-handed options for manager Bud Black in relief.

Black told reporters yesterday the struggling Cron was likely to hit the IL with back spasms. Toglia comes up for the first time this season to at least factor into the first base mix. The former first round pick is hitting .257/.364/.493 over 37 games with the Isotopes. He had a tough go in his first major league action last season, putting up a .216/.275/.378 line over 120 trips to the plate.

Rockies Select Michael Toglia

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The Rockies announced that they have selected first base prospect Michael Toglia to their roster and recalled infielder/outfielder Sean Bouchard. Outfielders Wynton Bernard and Sam Hilliard were optioned to Triple-A in corresponding moves. The club already had a vacancy on their 40-man roster for Toglia. Thomas Harding of MLB.com tweeted about Toglia’s promotion before the official announcement.

Toglia, 24, was a first-round draft pick, being selected 23rd overall by the Rockies in 2019. He landed on Baseball America’s list of top Colorado farmhands in 2020 and has been there ever since. He got into 41 games at Low-A the year of his draft, but missed out on formal game action in 2020 when the pandemic canceled the minor league seasons.

Getting back into action last year, the switch-hitter split his time between High-A and Double-A, hitting 22 home runs and stealing 10 bases in 115 games. Overall, he hit .228/.333/.445, walking in an impressive 13% of his plate appearances but also striking out in 28.5% of them. In 2022, he’s produced fairly similar results while splitting his time between Double-A and Triple-A. In 114 games between those two levels, he’s hit 30 long balls and swiped seven bags. His .249/.341/.510 batting line comes with a 12.1% walk rate but a 30.1% strikeout rate. Despite that high-strikeout approach, he’s still been 24% above average at the plate for the year, as evidenced by his 124 wRC+.

Defensively, Toglia has primarily played first base in his young career thus far, though he also played right field in nine games this season. The Rox have used C.J. Cron as their primary first baseman in recent seasons, though it may be possible for both he and Toglia to share the lineup. Cron is in the designated hitter slot tonight while Toglia will be making his MLB debut and playing first base. That could potentially limit the club’s flexibility if Toglia proves himself worthy of everyday at-bats, though Cron will be a free agent in just over a year. Also, if the club deems Toglia a passable defender in the outfield, he could see some time out there. The Rockies are 55-74 and in the NL West basement, 15 1/2 games out of a playoff spot. They can use the remaining weeks of the season to evaluate young players for future roles, with Toglia now stepping up for his audition.

Rockies’ Tim Collins Opts Out Of 2020 Season

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The Rockies announced Monday that left-hander Tim Collins has informed the club that he will opt out of the remainder of the 2020 season. He’d been in the team’s 60-man player pool but did not make the Opening Day, 30-man roster.

Colorado has also formally added nine players to its 60-man pool, per the announcement. Joining the group are right-handers Tommy Doyle, Karl Kauffmann and Wes Parsons; infielders Aaron Schunk, Michael Toglia, Ryan Vilade and Colton Welker; lefty Helcris Olivarez; and catcher Willie MacIver.

The Rockies’ announcement comes after two game — the Marlins/Orioles tilt in Miami and the Phillies/Yankees contest in Philadelphia — were postponed due to Covid-19 concerns. However, USA Today’s Bob Nightengale tweets that Collins had already informed the team of his decision to opt out prior to today’s news. That said, with 11 players and a pair of coaches testing positive in the Marlins organization alone since Friday, it’s certainly possible that we’ll see another wave of players decide to step away from the season citing health and safety concerns.

Collins, 30, was a staple in the Royals’ bullpen from 2011-14, pitching to a 3.54 ERA with better than a strikeout per frames part of a relief corps that eventually served as the backbone for consecutive World Series appearances. Unfortunately for Collins, he was only a part of the 2014 World Series runner-up roster, as he underwent Tommy John surgery early in 2015. When Collins appeared on the cusp of returning in 2016, he suffered a second UCL tear that led to a second Tommy John surgery.

All told, Collins missed the 2015-17 seasons while recovering, but he returned to the mound in 2018 and made it back to the Majors with the Nationals. In two seasons since his return, he’s totaled 31 1/3 frames in the Majors and logged a 4.02 ERA with a 25-to-15 K/BB ratio. He’s handled righties better than lefties in his career to date, so Collins isn’t necessarily impacted by the three-batter minimum rule like some other southpaws might be.

The 2020 season could’ve been a proving grounds of sorts for Collins, who is still young enough to reestablish himself as a quality reliever. But he’ll instead opt to step aside amid the current health concerns and likely look for another minor league deal this winter.

Rockies Sign First-Rounder Michael Toglia

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The Rockies have signed first-round pick Michael Toglia, Patrick Saunders of the Denver Post reports. Toglia’s pick (No. 23) came with a $2.93MM slot value, but the team gave him $2.725MM, per Jim Callis of MLB.com and Jon Heyman of MLB Network (Twitter links).

The 20-year-old Toglia’s a first baseman from UCLA whom Callis and Jonathan Mayo ranked as the 40th-best prospect available entering the draft. They note the 6-foot-5, switch-hitting Toglia showed “huge raw power from both sides of the plate” during his tenure with the Bruins. However, it’s in question whether the 20-year-old will make enough contact to capitalize on his power going forward.

With Toglia under contract, the Rockies have now inked their top two picks of this year’s draft. They signed second-rounder Aaron Schunk for $1.1MM last week. The club entered the draft with just over $7MM to spend on its choices.

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