Monday, December 15

SAN DIEGO -- Rockies second-base prospect Adael Amador showed the fruits of his homework on Sunday afternoon, which otherwise was another back-to-the-drawing board day for this struggling club.

Amador, called up from Triple-A Albuquerque ahead of Colorado’s 6-0 loss to the Padres at Petco Park, moved quickly to his left and dove to snare Elias Díaz’s line drive. Told to work on his defense when sent down during Spring Training, Amador also participated in three double plays.

“The biggest thing was defense,” Amador said in Spanish, with Edwin Perez interpreting. “They wanted me to keep working on my defense so that anything that’s hit toward me I convert into an out. More than anything, I’ve got to just enjoy myself out there.”

Amador, ranked by MLB Pipeline as the Rockies’ No. 7 prospect, batted .171 during a painful 10-game callup last year after being called up from Double-A Hartford. He returns confident after a solid start in Albuquerque.

“I don’t think it took me too much time [to put the struggles behind],” Amador said. “I generally think that any moment is a learning moment, and anything you learn you’ve got to take something away from it. I was able to turn the page and look forward to this season.”

Amador, who turned 22 on Friday, could eventually prove a baby step toward the solution for the Rockies, whose 3-12 record is tied with 2019 for the worst 15-game start in their history. There’s no immediate relief, with a three-game series starting Monday against the reigning-champion Dodgers.

Amador’s presence on the club points toward one of the problems that glared during the three-game, three-shutout sweep at the hands of the Padres. Counting Amador, the Rockies started four players who haven’t spent a Major League season uninterrupted by time in the Minors. 

Combine unsteady, inexperienced players with also-struggling veterans, and what do you get? Try a team whose 27-inning scoreless streak is three innings shy of the club record (September 30-Oct. 3, 2010).

“It’s a big translation to the Major Leagues, right?” manager Bud Black said. “You look at today’s lineup -- Amador, Zac Veen and Hunter Goodman. Also Michael Toglia, whose service time is [low] but his at-bats are starting to get to a point where you see that transition occur.”

Still, Amador (0-for-3 with a strikeout against two-hit, complete-game winner ) has shown traits the Rockies are missing.

Amador entered last year as the team’s No. 1 prospect. Anticipating his first Major League chance last year, Amador tried to bulk up, but an oblique injury flared before his callup from Double-A Hartford and ended his trip to the Majors. A transition from shortstop to second base that proved difficult didn’t help.

This year, he joined Rockies third baseman Ryan McMahon in shifting from a training program that produced bigger muscles to one based on movement. Amador also gave up Dominican candies that worked against him being in peak condition and sought out trainers with experience working with football players, whose sport requires quick bursts.

Amador performed well enough in Spring Training to receive consideration for the Major League roster when Thairo Estrada sustained a right wrist fracture late in camp. A sign of progress came in the March 16 Spring Breakout against the White Sox in Glendale, Ariz., when Amador homered and scooted far to his left to begin an eye-catching double play.

Amador continued the quality at Triple-A Albuquerque -- a .275/.408/.450 slash line with a double, two home runs, four RBIs, eight walks (against four strikeouts) and three stolen bases. For a team that’s struggling to put the ball in play, Amador could be a welcome addition.

“I showed confidence -- that was the major thing that was lacking last year,” Amador said. “That’s a big part of my game, having that confidence to show my abilities out there.”

The Rockies recalled Amador and placed utility player Tyler Freeman on the 10-day injured list with a left oblique strain that he sustained Saturday while preparing to start the game against the Padres.

When time came to design the Rockies’ new City Connect uniform, team photographer Kyle Cooper made the decision easy with his “Baseball Sky” pictures.

Cooper finds the colors of the Colorado sky at their most vivid about 10-15 minutes after sunset. Many Rockies fans agree, judging by the mobile phone photos that have populated the internet over the years.

The Rockies and Nike leaned into Cooper’s professional shots by studying them before arriving at the color combination -- psychic purple, cobalt blue, razor pink and laser orange.

“It’s really cool that the Coors Field sunsets that you capture over the years turn into the inspiration for a jersey that is worn on the field -- under those sunsets,” Cooper said.

Center fielder Brenton Doyle has been dealing with left quadriceps soreness since it cropped up during the Philadelphia series April 4-6, but he played all six games of the team’s opening homestand. On Thursday afternoon, Doyle went 3-for-5 with a homer and five RBIs against the Brewers.

The injury only hurt when he ran. It didn’t bother him hitting, as the numbers showed.

Still, Doyle didn’t start any of the three games at San Diego. Monday is decision time in Los Angeles.

“Today, there were some good improvements,” said Doyle, who said he has done some swinging to keep the feel he had in Denver. “... Fingers crossed, I’ll wake up, it’s really good and I can get back in there for the Dodgers series. [Monday] is probably the true test.”

The 8-0 loss to the Padres on Friday night at Petco Park marked the second straight start that righty Germán Márquez had a bad inning that turned a potentially good start bad. But he felt different about that one than he did on April 5, when he couldn’t grip the ball properly on a cold night during a 7-4 home loss to the Athletics.

Against the Padres in the fifth, a catcher’s interference call against Goodman negated a possible double play. The inning spiraled into six runs, five earned. But Márquez thought he could have had better results.

“It was all on fastballs, because I wanted a ground ball so bad,” Márquez said. “It worked, but they found the holes.”

The big disappointment came when his onetime catcher, Elias Díaz, hit a moderate-speed single through the drawn-in infield. The two gave each other a look and talked about it as friends later.

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