Rockies get first taste of the "opener" and it might expose them

It’s no secret that the Colorado Rockies lineup has been hyper-dependent on their big bats this season to find victories. By wRC+, only Nolan Arenado, Charlie Blackmon, DJ LeMahieu and Trevor Story have been above average hitters, and naturally, have found themselves at the top of the lineup. As the Los Angeles Dodgers come into town looking to make up ground on the first-place Rockies, they will be taking an unorthodox approach to handling the late scratch of anticipated starter Kenta Maeda.

With Maeda on the disabled-list and another starter, Alex Wood, needing to be pushed back to Sunday with hamstring cramps, the normal way for Dodgers skipper Dave Roberts to fill the gap would be with one of their long relievers. Instead, the Dodgers will be taking a play out of the book of Tampa Bay Rays manager Kevin Cash, giving set up man Scott Alexander the first start of his MLB career.

Alexander is a short reliever who hasn’t thrown more than two innings in an outing since July 17 of last year and hasn’t started in professional baseball since 2016, when he made two starts out of 27 appearances in the minors. Before that, he hadn’t started since 2012 — a year he spent entirely between Rookie- and A-ball.

So why will he get the ball to start in the most notorious hitter’s park MLB has to offer?

With the injury circumstances and a new revolution started by Cash and traditional reliever Sergio Romo in Tampa, Alexander will become the newest guinea pig in the experiment being casually dubbed as “openers.” While it was an opportunity for Roberts to give rookie Dennis Santana his first MLB start in his debut — who has started in all of his minor league outings above A-ball — he will instead get the ball in the second or third, according to the Dodgers manager.

From a strategic standpoint, it could make sense for the Dodgers to start the game with one of their best relievers. Alexander is extremely tough on lefties, who are hitting .212 off him this year. The Rockies, meanwhile, have hit the left-handed Charlie Blackmon leadoff for the majority of the seasont. Following him is typically LeMahieu, but the two have been swapped for tonight’s game.

In LeMahieu’s absence, the Rockies have filled the two-hole with left-handed hitters David Dahl for 11 games and Gerardo Parra for 10. Had the Rockies not gotten LeMahieu back, their normal lineup construction would play into the strength of the de-facto Dodgers starter, even if Blackmon is actually putting up reverse splits numbers this season. Parra is hitting .220 and Dahl was at an abysmal .143 before he was placed on the disabled list.

But it’s not just the handedness advantage that makes this interesting. Alexander was dealt to Los Angeles after a fantastic 2017 with Kansas City, where his success against both hands was very similar. In fact, Alexander has historically put up even-to-reverse splits in his career and has really only put up LOOGY-esque numbers this season. The point being, he’s a solid pitcher that has been used to get anybody out and has done so effectively. He will be taking on a very top heavy Rockies lineup, one that could be more vulnerable than others to the “opener.”

The Rockies haven’t been the offensive juggernaut that they have been in years past, but when they’ve had success, it’s been from the top of the order. Hitters one through four are producing a wRC+ of 113, putting them in 13th in baseball from those spots in the order. But after the cleanup hitter, the Rockies are hitting .205/.274/.324, good for 46 wRC+, or 54 percent below the league average and worst in baseball. For context, the 29th place Arizona Diamondbacks are a full nine points ahead of them.

The idea of the “opener” is to use one of your backend relievers to tackle the toughest hitters on their first go-around and then let the pitcher who can throw longer get a fresh start against the weaker hitters in the lineup. In theory, it helps “starters” avoid running their pitch count up early by having to be careful with tougher hitters, and allows them to go deeper into games by hiding their arsenal from the one-through-four spots, who will only be seeing the starter for the second time in their third at-bat. It helps them maintain deception and keep their cards close to their chest in terms of approach.

What this means for the Rockies is the order spots they’ve depended on more so than any other team in baseball this season will not be having the familiarity with the pitcher they’re accustomed to having in any of their at-bats. They will not know how they are being attacked and will see two different arsenals. The bottom of the order, who has hit better recently but has a longer track record of struggle, will be the benefactors of seeing the longer pitcher’s higher counts and for a third at-bat should they get that far, which is marginalized by poor hitting.

If there is a team that the concept of an “opener” is most likely to succeed against, it very well could be the Rockies. It remains to be seen how true that will hold tonight.