By Kyle Newman | The Denver Post
Ryan Rolison’s name has been tossed around quite a bit at Rockies’ summer camp. By manager Bud Black. By pitching coaches Steve Foster and Darryl Scott. By Colorado hurlers and position players alike.
And they’re all singing the same tune:
Rolison, the club’s 2018 first-round pick out of Ole Miss, does not look the part of a 23-year-old left-hander who spent all of last season in Class-A and is the youngest pitcher in Colorado’s two versions of spring training this year.
Rolison is a 2016 graduate of the University School of Jackson.
“Rolison has showed some maturity and what he’s made of in this (big-league environment),” Scott said. “He’s opened some eyes.”
Rolison started 2019 with Class-A Asheville, posting a 0.61 ERA in three starts and getting a quick promotion to Class-A Advanced Lancaster. With the Jethawks, pitching in a notoriously hitter-friendly California League, Rolison had a 4.87 ERA in 22 starts.
Since “summer camp” began at Coors Field on July 4, Rolison’s been building off the momentum he started as a non-roster invitee in his first big-league spring training in Arizona. The southpaw tossed a pair of impressive scoreless innings in an intersquad scrimmage July 11, his birthday, and has held his own on the mound in other appearances against veterans and all-stars in Colorado’s lineup.
But those fans hoping a weird season could get weirder (in a good way) with Rolison making his MLB debut — something that would be fairly unprecedented given his experience, but a remote possibility nonetheless — “probably want to pump the brakes a bit,” according to Black.
“The fact that he played in a major conference, in the Southeastern Conference as a Friday night starter and all the things that go into that, there’s a pretty strong foundation there,” Black said. “But college baseball is different from the pro game, and I think Ryan needs a little bit more seasoning, even though we like what we’ve seen so far.”
But Black did leave himself a little wiggle room: “You can never say never to anything, right?”
Consider last season, when the Colorado pitching staff was decimated by injuries and ineptitude down the stretch. That led the rotationally-thinned Rockies to turn to a 29-year-old washed-out starter, Tim Melville, who began the season in an independent league and was working in a barbecue joint just before that.
So while Rolison will start 2020 with the satellite squad in Albuquerque, he could be an option for Colorado down the line should health become an issue for the rotation, or should the team perform poorly and be open to seeing young talent in September. Among Rockies pitching prospects, right-handed starter Ryan Castellani and left-handed reliever Ben Bowden are most likely next in line to make their debuts.
(PHOTO: Ryan Rolison)
