Biggest Offseason Acquisition: Somehow not applicable.

Potential Fatal Flaw: Let’s just start with the pitching.

Ceiling: 4th place in the NL West

Floor: 5th place in the NL West

Overall: In 2007, the Colorado Rockies advanced to the World Series. It appeared to be the start of a long period of great success.

The Rockies have made the playoffs once since that season, losing in the NLDS in 2009 to the Phillies. Jim Tracy won the “Manager of the Year” award that season, which I add only to cite an example of how hilarious manager/coach of the year awards are.

That 2009 season was the ceiling for this era of the Colorado Rockies. Since that season, the team has been in a never-ending state of rebuilding. In 2011, they traded ace pitcher Ubaldo Jimenez to the Cleveland Indians. Jimenez was 27 at the time and coming off a career year that saw him finish third in Cy Young voting with an ERA + (a means of measuring park-affected pitching) of 161 (trust me, that’s quite good. David Price’s ERA + last season was 149. He won the AL Cy Young.).

The point here is that the Colorado Rockies took a 27 year old pitcher with great stuff, coming off a career year, and traded him mid-season. Now, some (mostly idiots) would argue that they gave up on him at just the right time because Jimenez flamed out in Cleveland and doesn’t appear like he’ll ever re-establish himself as an elite pitcher. There are too many variables to draw that hypothesis though. AL vs. NL. Team defense. Organizational tweaks to mechanics and the like. I could go on.

The (real) point here is that the Colorado Rockies are not a well run franchise. They’ve turned years of futility into absolutely squat through the draft. Their first round picks are a who’s who of first round busts, since Troy Tulowitzki in 2005: Gregory Reynolds, Casey Weathers, Christian Friedrich, Tyler Matzek, Tim Wheeler, Peter Tago, Kyle Parker, Tyler Anderson, David Dahl. All but two of them (Matzek and Tago) were college players. None of them have been even remotely useful Major Leaguers. In fact, just for fun, here are just a few of the players drafted after Gregory Reynolds in 2006 (who they took with the second overall pick): Evan Longoria, Brandon Morrow, Clayton Kershaw, Tim Lincecum, Max Scherzer, and Ian Kennedy.

Trades haven’t helped the Rockies much either. That Jimenez trade? It netted them Drew Pomeranz, Matt McBride, and Alex White. White doesn’t even play for the Rockies anymore. McBride has 81 plate appearances in his career and a robust (-1.1) career WAR. Pomeranz is in the running for their number five spot in the rotation.

It’s really hard to rebuild when you aren’t good at evaluating players. Colorado should be forever thankful for Troy Tulowitzki. Tulo signed a long-term extension with the Rockies a few years ago that will keep him in Denver until 2020.  At the very least, he gives them a building block to constantly pile heaps of garbage around.

This really is the same team from last year. They made no minor tweaks to what was a terrible team in 2012, save for bringing in the completely inexperienced (no, really, he’s never managed a team. Ever) Walt Weiss to pirate the ship. If Spring Training means anything (it doesn’t) you can anticipate lots of bunting. And losses. They can’t pitch and outside of Tulowitzki, Dexter Fowler, and Carlos Gonzalez (the latter in home games only because, splits) they won’t wow you with offense like the vintage Colorado Rockies.

This is a franchise with bigger concerns than succeeding in 2013. That’s not going to happen. I just wonder when they’ll be able to compete at all. Right now, I can’t see that far into the future.

Predicted Finish: 64-98