Following a rough season in which the team finished third-worst in the National League, the Colorado Rockies took a step towards the future on Wednesday night, hiring Walt Weiss as the team's new manager.
The Rockies made the announcement at the winter general managers meeting, which is being held in California at an Indian Wells hotel that Rockies owner Dick Monfort owns. Team officials along with Monfort met together over the week and decided to hire Weiss.
According to a team spokesman, Weiss will be introduced on Friday at a press conference at Coors Field.
Weiss will replace former manager Jim Tracy, who resigned from the team on Oct. 7. At the time he still has one year and $1.4 million left on his contract.
"It was a lot of different things," said general manager Dan O'Dowd about the hiring to ESPN.com.
Weiss is a former major league shortstop and won the 1988 American League Rookie of the Year while playing Oakland. He was with the "Rockies from 1994 to '97 and was a special assistant to general manager Dan O'Dowd from 2002 to '08," according to ESPN.com.
The Rockies have followed a popular trend in baseball in recent years by hiring a former player. The St. Louis Cardinals hired former catcher Mike Matheny last year, while the Chicago White Sox brought in third baseman Robin Ventura as manager.
"I am trying to get my head around this and over the past few weeks I have come to grips with it. There are going to be things that I won't foresee that will be part of the job. I will figure things out," Weiss told The Denver Post.
Weiss was previously coaching high school baseball at Regis Jesuit High School in Denver. According to ESPN, Weiss led the team "to a 20-6 record and the 5A semifinals of the state championship. Weiss' son, Brody, is in his senior year at the school."
Arizona coach Matt William, Rockies bench coach Tom Runnells and first baseman Jason Giambi were also in the running for the job.
According to ESPN.com: "Weiss, 48, spent parts of 14 seasons in the major leagues, also playing for Oakland (1987-92), Florida (1993) and Atlanta (1998-2000). A .258 career hitter, he was an All-Star in the 1998 game at Denver's Coors Field."
Senior vice president of major league operations Bill Geivett spoke about Weiss' hiring, saying that the team was more familiar with him then with other candidates.
"He would take trips in the minor leagues. He was always around with the major league club at home, as well," Geivett said earlier Wednesday. "I know Walt pretty well."
According to ESPN.com, Weiss will become the sixth manager in franchise history, along with Don Baylor (1993-98), Jim Leyland (1999), Buddy Bell (2000-02), Clint Hurdle (2002-09) and Tracy (2009-12).
The team had a lot of internal issues during the season, including in the clubhouse. According to ESPN.com, Tracy did not feel comfortable after "the assistant general manager had moved into an office in the clubhouse."
According to ESPN.com, "Things changed dramatically for Tracy on Aug. 1 when Geivett, the assistant general manager, was given an office in the clubhouse and began focusing on roster management, particularly as it related to the pitchers, and evaluating the coaching staff and the rest of the players. Tracy's responsibilities were narrowed to game management and meeting with the media."
"I thought we worked together fine," Geivett said after Tracy's surprise resignation last month.
The team finished with a 64-98 record, ahead of only the Chicago Cubs and Houston Astros in the National League. Tracy took the team to the playoffs in 2010 and was voted National League manager of the year, but the team slipped greatly in 2012.
The biggest weakness for the team was its starting pitching. The team finished with a 5.22 ERA and only amassed 27 quality starts throughout the year. The offense was less of a problem; the team finished in the top ten in the league in batting average, runs, slugging percentage and on base percentage.
Another issue for the team was the strange choice to use a four-man rotation towards the end of the season as well as a 75-pitch limit for its pitchers. The Rockies hoped to conserve their young arms for next season and sed relievers to help finish games once the limit was reached.
The team also suffered a range of injuries to key players, including to franchise shortstop Troy Tulowitzki, who played only 47 games. Tulowitzki hit only .287 with eight home runs and 27 RBIs a season after he was a possible MVP candidate. In 2011, he hit .302 with 30 home runs and 105 RBIs.
For the team to improve they will need to shore up their pitching staff big time, including using the normal five-man rotation again.
The team has young talent in Tulowitzki and Carlos Gonzalez, but without a top-flight starter, they will have a tough mountain to climb to catch the World Series champion San Francisco Giants.
