RYAN, EDWIN
6/18/33 - 2/1/21
Edwin J. Ryan passed away into the arms of Jesus and reunited with his wife on 2/1/2021. Ed is survived by 3 children, 8 grand and many great grand children. He was a hard worker & loved his family. He was a good & funny man, “but looks aren’t everything.”
What do you get a Colorado baseball lover for Valentine’s Day?
A dust bin and broom to sweep up the shards of a broken heart.
But cheer up and put on a smiley face, Rockies fans. This team has a chance to make Colorado baseball history.
Since the Rockies began playing ball in 1993, they have never lost 100 games in a season.
Oh, they’ve tried. But Alex Cole, who turned playing center field into a Jumanji jungle misadventure, couldn’t pull off that feat of futility with an expansion franchise. Todd and the Toddlers, truly awful teams that burdened Helton with young misfits you wouldn’t want to know with a scorecard, never lost 100 in a season. Even Jeremy Guthrie, who tipped his cap to jeering fans in Coors Field after getting rocked
from the mound in 2012, got out of town before he could flush this team completely down the drain of ineptitude.
After sending third baseman Nolan Arenado and $51 million to the St. Louis Cardinals in the worst trade anyone in Colorado has ever seen, however, anything is possible.
We’re on the Road to 100. The Rockies are piling in a clown car. Let’s celebrate them for the joke owner Dick Monfort has made out of this franchise.
Barely two years ago, Colorado signed Arenado to a $260 million contract and this ballclub was seriously talking about being a World Series contender.
But take a look at the Rockies now. Every time this team takes the field in LoDo, cheesy calliope music should be blasted over the sound system. Colorado has a real chance to lose 100 games. Says who? Well, the annual PECOTA projections recently released by number crunchers at Baseball Prospectus suggest our Bad News Denver Bears will be the worst team in the majors, predicting the LoDo lads will finish the season with a 60-102 record.
When the Rockies report to spring training later this week, the best player in franchise history will be long gone, off to get fitted with a Redbirds uniform. But general manager Jeff Bridich will still be behind the wheel of the clown car.
No sports organization that cared one iota about winning would pick Bridich over Arenado.
Back in the day, when Broncos coach Dan Reeves got crosswise with John Elway, the face of the franchise stayed in orange and blue. Reeves was far more accomplished as an NFL coach than Bridich can ever hope to be as a baseball executive. But Reeves got shown the door for the high crime and misdemeanor of turning the face of the franchise into a red mad emoji.
On the Road to 100, however, sports logic gets lost.
Monfort thinks the Rockies have a good team, because he’s not in the baseball business. He measures success in beers sales on the party deck and his cut of restaurant profits at McGregor Square. So is it any wonder dolphins at SeaWorld get treated with more respect than a third basemen at 20th and Blake?
Monfort, however, is no dummy. He sells sunshine to suckers, because that’s a whole lot cheaper and more profitable than going to all the trouble of building a championship contender.
Nobody loves talking baseball more than Rockies manager Bud Black, one of the most relentlessly upbeat men I’ve met in more than 35 years of covering Colorado sports.
But when the Rockies gather for the first team meeting of spring training after a nuclear winter, what can Black possibly tell his players? I might suggest beginning with these two words: I’m sorry.
A 100-loss season, however, could be the best thing for baseball lovers in Colorado. Gross incompetence on the diamond would not only expose the Rockies as the worstrun sports franchise in North American sports, it might actually cause fans to so loudly demand change that Monfort will have to consider firing Bridich.
For shortstop Trevor Story, outfielder Charlie Blackmon and pitcher Jon Gray, their fondest hope for 2021 is to play well enough to get moved at the trade deadline to a team that cares about winning.
Unless your name is Bridich, who puts on his grumpypants every morning and brings gloom to every room he enters, life’s too short to be miserable.
So cue the cheesy circus music. And hop in the clown car, y’all.
We’re on the Road to 100.
Michael Porter Jr. rose up for a contested 3-pointer against the Bucks — early in the shot-clock, no ball movement, with the Nuggets trailing in the fourth quarter — when Nikola Jokic could no longer hide his frustration.
Porter’s jumper predictably clanked off the rim. Jokic hardly chased the rebound, but later ran over to Porter for some direct mentorship. Later that night, following a third straight Denver loss, Jokic said blankly: “I told (Porter) after the game: ‘That’s just a bad shot.’”
Brutal honesty, it seems, is Jokic’s preferred leadership style.
Porter embraces the tough love.
“Me and Nikola’s relationship, a lot of it is him getting on me knowing I can be better,” Porter told reporters this week. “I don’t take any of that personally. I’m my biggest critic. I know I can be better, especially when I have bad games. We’ve got a good relationship on the court. He just expects a lot from me.”
The Nuggets’ decision to select Porter with the 14th overall pick of the 2018 NBA draft continues to produce mixed returns. The weeks-long injury absence of shooting guard Gary Harris (thigh) has given Porter a starting audition in four games, entering Sunday’s home tilt vs. the Lakers, with the Nuggets 2-2 over that span.
In losses to Sacramento and Milwaukee, Porter shot 30% from the floor with a combined minus-11.5 rating. He scored 8 points in each game. But in consecutive wins over the Cavaliers and Thunder, Porter responded by shooting at a 56% clip — including 5-of-13 from deep — with a combined 34 points and a plus-18.5 rating. Yet his hustle plays were arguably more impressive in a showcase of Porter’s continuing NBA maturation.
“I wanted Michael Porter to know, in front of his teammates, that I thought he played a great game (against Cleveland),” coach Michael Malone said. “Mike has had games where he’s put up big numbers, but I thought Michael played a complete basketball game. Offensively, shooting the ball with confidence, spacing the floor correctly. Defensively, being engaged. Helping and being in the right spots.”
Porter added: “It’s tough when you expect a lot of yourself, especially when it’s two or three games strung together where you don’t play your best. For me, it’s just trying to take the emotion out of it, really dissect it, and understand what I can do to be better. Just look at it from that angle. That’s what I’ve been trying to do every game.”
On Friday, the Jokic-Porter connection was especially strong with Porter cutting to the basket, then finishing Jokic assists with easy dunks. Porter took a dribble-handoff from Jokic in the second half, and with a clean look, cashed in an open 3pointer.
The bench went wild as Malone sent double fist-pumps into the air at Ball Arena.
“The more chemistry that Michael and Nikola create is only going to help us,” Malone said. “Just a well-executed play. The timing was right, the read was right, and we want him knocking down the shot. Just really good basketball.”
Expanding Porter’s shooting confidence means a likelihood of more difficult shot attempts ahead, should the 22-year-old fulfill his ceiling as a prolific NBA scorer. Porter said: “I shoot a lot of contested threes because I feel like nobody can block my shot.” Porter also recognized his game must evolve to maximize his role on the team.
“Attacking the rim, I think that needs to be a point of emphasis for me more going forward and not just floating around the 3-point line trying to find my rhythm. When I finally touch the ball, after a while, trying to make a shot can be hard to do,” Porter said. “I need to find my rhythm and make it a point of emphasis to attack the rim more, and try to get to the (free-throw) line.”
But know this: When Porter’s game slips, and he fails to meet the sky-high expectations of teammates, he can expect to hear about it.
“Frustration is a good thing. Being mad is a good thing,” Jokic said. “To get on yourself and the team is a good thing. It’s just going to make us better, hopefully.”