Ranking The Rockies: 27 Brandon Barnes

We at BSN Denver are running a series where we rank how valuable each of the Colorado Rockies’ 51 players was to the team in 2015. Value was calculated by statistics, viewing, and how memorable each player’s contributions were. The rankings will be from last to first, you may view the full rankings (here)

Player: Brandon Barnes

Stats: 106 G, 281 PA, .251 AVG, .314 OBP, .341 SLG, 2 HR, 17 RBI, 62 wRC+, -1.5 UZR, -0.6  WAR

Big Moment: Aug 26, the Rockies are in Atlanta visiting the Braves. Atlanta pitcher Edwin Jackson is relieving starter Shelby Miller with the Braves down one. With two outs in the 8th inning, Daniel Descalso doubles and Barnes comes up to bat. On the eighth pitch of the at-bat, Barnes hit his second home run of the year securing a 6-3 Rockies win. In the game, Barnes had two other hits, a single and a double finishing with his most total bases of the 2015 season with seven.

Season Recap: He was a surprise opening day roster snub, but he joined the club in mid-May after spending 33 games with the Isotopes. He wasn’t particularly good in Triple-A, but it was known he would be back in the majors sooner or later. With the injuries sustained in the Rockies outfield and Drew Stubbs‘ struggles Barnes was back with the big club before summer. He was slightly worse than he was in 2014, but he proved once again that he can be a useful bench player. He was a solid defensive outfielder and he was the Rockies main spark plug at times.

What’s Ahead: Barnes should be Super-Two’ed, which means he will be arbitration eligible because he falls in the top 22% of players with service time between two and three years. This means he won’t make the league minimum anymore, but he isn’t really good enough to get paid enough where it would set the Rockies back. He will most likely be brought back because he is cheap and he fits the Rockies mold.