BSN Exclusive: Rockies farmhand returns after wild ride

Scottsdale, Arizona – Back in December during one of the slowest parts of another sluggish offseason, Colorado Rockies catcher Chris Rabago was busy becoming a member of three major league organizations in the span of only a few hours.

When the carousel of transactions stopped, Rabago was back home with the club that he had spent his entire professional life.

What looked on the outside like an oddity of baseball, a funny quirk where a player left and re-joined a team in the span of a few hours, turned out to be a moment that held much deeper meaning for the player involved.

“I spent my whole career here and just to be picked up and back here shows how much they appreciate me,” said Rabago in front of the same row of lockers he had occupied last Spring Training.

Only this time his route was more circuitous than linear.

Rabago played baseball at Riverside Poly High School, which churned out twelve major leaguers – including fourteen-year veteran Bobby Bonds, the Dodgers’ Austin Barnes and Astros’ Jake Marisnick – before playing collegiately at UC-Irvine for famed head coach Mike Gillespie.

He helped lead the Anteaters to the College World Series in his junior year, getting knocked off by eventual champion Vanderbilt; with a strong pedigree and penchant for winning, the middle infielder was taken in the 13th round by Colorado in the 2014 MLB Draft.

In his first stop as a professional, Rabago went to Tri-City Dust Devils of the short-season Northwest League, playing 46 games at shortstop while hitting for one of the lowest on-base-plus-slugging averages on the team.

The athletic 21-year-old was given the opportunity to transition to catcher, following in the footsteps of other former infielders in the Rockies organization like Tony Wolters, Dom Nuñez, and, as we’ll see this year, 2018 21st round pick Hunter Stovall.

In 2015, Rabago played with Grand Junction and hit .307 while putting his primary focus on his new trade; he followed that up with another solid season at the plate by hitting .272 at Low-A Asheville in 2016.

The next year, in arguably his best all-around season, Rabago put up a slash line of .272/.350/.393 in 358 plate appearances at Advanced-A Lancaster, earning a spot as an organizational All-Star at catcher for the Rockies.

The outstanding season led to his addition to the 40-man roster that November along with outfielder Yonathan Daza and starting pitchers Jesus Tinoco and Sam Howard.

But in 2018, Rabago hit a snag at Double-A Hartford, striking out 22.8 percent of the time – up from a career rate of 17.0 percent – and, in the process, lost playing time to Nuñez.

Meanwhile, Colorado was making a push for the playoffs in August and in order to make room for Matt Holliday on the 40-man roster, Rabago was placed on waivers.

The move was a major disappointment to Rabago, but one that came as a simple roster crunch for the surging Rockies.

“They told me all along how they felt. They never lied to me and I appreciate that,” noted Rabago.

On August 22, he was claimed on waivers by the New York Yankees, where his brother Hector Rabago is a minor league coach, and quickly outrighted to the minors two days later after slipping through waivers.

Rabago was sent back to the Double-A Eastern League by New York. Forced to travel back to Hartford for a three-game series as a member of the Trenton Thunder, he would go 0-10 against his old club, which held nothing but good memories for the catcher.

“Everyone there is great, people are friendly,” Rabago said. “Hartford is great,”

When his stint with the Yankees was complete, he had played in 7 games with Trenton and hit just .071/.133/.071 in 28 at-bats.

With the season behind him, Rabago was set to put 2018 in the rearview mirror by taking care of one major personal piece of business.

“I got married. Great wedding, had a good time,” Rabago shined proudly. “That was the highlight of my offseason.”

But on December 12, Rabago’s offseason journey would only begin, professionally speaking.

“It was pretty unexpected. I wasn’t paying too much attention to it at first,” he said of the day’s activities.

On the final day of the Winter Meetings, the Kansas City Royals selected Rabago in the minor league phase of the Rule 5 Draft after the Yankees decided to not protect him.

As Rabago detailed the events, “I got a text from one of my buddies saying that I was with the Royals. Then, my brother called me. We were talking and he said, ‘Have you heard from them. I don’t know what’s going on.’”

The Royals would quickly turn around and trade Rabago back to the Rockies for cash considerations.

The tale of Rabago’s ride was nearly complete:

“So, I was just waiting for a phone call to see what was going on. I got a call from Zach Wilson (Rockies Assistant General Manager and Farm Director) and he asked, ‘Do you know what’s going on?’ ‘I guess I’m a Royal.’ Then he said, ‘Well, you’re coming back home where you belong.’”

The moment sent shockwaves through Rabago who instantaneously felt at ease after a difficult few months of instability.

“I was pretty pumped (after the phone call). I spent my whole career here and just to be back here and to be picked up shows how much they appreciate me and everything I’ve done. Rabago added, “I’m forever loyal to what they’ve done for me.”

Back in the fold with his first family, Rabago is at peace and glad to be in Scottsdale once more.

After the strange trip around the league, his outlook is pretty simple for Spring Training and the 2019 season.

“Just compete every day. Try not to overcomplicate things. Go day-by-day and get after it.”