Why the Colorado Rockies have signed the perfect former Dodgers outfielder

In the middle of a sea of sudden news spilling down the MLB mountain, it was quietly reported and later confirmed by Colorado Rockies GM Jeff Bridich that the club has agreed to terms on a minor league deal with former Dodgers outfielder and multiple-time All-Star Matt Kemp.

This has sparked a series of questions from fans and media.

Of all the former Dodgers’ outfielders, why the 35-year-old Kemp and not the much more exciting and younger Yasiel Puig? What will his role be? From whom would he be taking playing time? And what exactly do the Rockies hope to get out of this, if anything?

It should first be noted that signing a right-handed bat with some power made sense for the team before the announcement that Ian Desmond will be stepping away from MLB for 2020. Bridich mentioned on a conference call on Tuesday that signing Kemp was in the works before Desmond’s decision was final.

However, it is worth recognizing that the two veterans in their mid-30s have similar profiles and one can’t help but see Kemp filling in where Desmond was likely to be employed this year.

For those who missed it at the end of the dreadful 2019 campaign, Raimel Tapia was more-or-less named this team’s starting left fielder and his performance at the interrupted Spring Training further cemented that he’d likely to get the bulk of starts next to Charlie Blackmon and David Dahl in a fully healthy Colorado outfield.

The now-26-year-old has never been given regular starting time and there is a belief among many, especially me, that once he is allowed to shine he will do exactly that. Tapia is also the kind of rhythm player who, if he gets hot at the right time, can be a difference maker in a 60-game season and there is no reason to cut him off before he even gets the chance.

Even with the continued growth of Tapia, Desmond’s departure – coupled with questions about the health of Charlie Blackmon and David Dahl – made it a necessity to add more outfield depth.

As such, spending a bit more money on a player like Puig, who would also need to start lest he become an even bigger problem in the clubhouse than his normal presence would be anyway, just doesn’t make sense.

But isn’t Puig far and away the better player? Let’s get some facts on the table:

Since 2015, on balance Kemp and Puig have been nearly identical players. So the question is really about who best compliments what the Colorado roster and clubhouse already has.

In addition to being a bad personality fit with the current stars of the Rockies, and a well-known heat magnet, Puig doesn’t fit conceptually with what Colorado is trying to accomplish on the baseball diamond.

His best attribute, when compared directly to Kemp, is his athleticism. Puig is the better defender with a far better arm. His legs, a full six years younger than Kemp’s, would be in better shape as well.

But this is where many on the outside looking in would hope the Rockies should just acquire fun players with exciting talent and where all would be missing a big part of the picture.

Especially with the universal DH this season, the Rockies don’t need an outfielder for defensive purposes. Dahl, Tapia, Garrett Hampson, Sam Hilliard, Yonathan Daza, and even Chris Owings give the club a ton of speed, athleticism, and glovework in the field. Very few people have seen it yet, but Hilliard’s arm is comparable to Puig’s. A majority of Colorado’s group of outfielder have better speed as well.

In other words, the signing of Kemp was always going to be about the offense.

There is still an argument to be made for Puig in that realm. He was much better than Kemp last season (when Kemp was hurt) putting up a 109 OPS+ once he was traded to a team he cared about playing for. He sat on a 95 OPS+ until that time. The season before that, he was right at league average with an OPS+ of 100.

Kemp, meanwhile, was admittedly bad, but not fully healthy last year. He hit just .200 over 20 games before shutting it all down.

The season before that, though? He was an All-Star who hit .290/.338/.481 with 21 homers in 2018.

You may be inclined to expect Kemp’s numbers to drop off dramatically as he approaches 36-years-old. In conjunction with that, we’d probably see plenty more left in the tank for the 29-year-old Puig. But taking their collective healthy hitting numbers over the last several years – no matter how you parse it – suggests Kemp is the better all-around slugger.

This is all before we get to the splits that could turn this from an intriguing depth move to one that could have a huge positive impact for the Rockies this season.

Every Rockies fan who has been awake and paying attention for the last decade knows this singular truth: Matt Kemp absolutely rakes at Coors Field.

This can be one of those weird things in sports where we all recognize a pattern and assign it meaning that it doesn’t really have. Apart from the obvious reasons why anyone would like to hit baseballs at Coors Field, it has never been totally clear why Kemp seems to feast like he’s at a Las Vegas buffet every time he arrives in Denver.

The numbers?

In 86 games played, Kemp has hit .327/.389/.616 with 21 home runs and 77 RBI in 375 plate appearances at Coors Field. Yowza.

There is no way to know how that will translate once he is calling the ballpark home, but it’s not exactly a small sample size you can just hand waive away either. If Kemp can rekindle his Coors Field magic and put up what are essentially Hall of Fame numbers in his new home ballpark, Colorado just made the steal of the year.

Here is that stat that likely swung things in favor of Kemp: He crushes lefties to the tune of a .911 career OPS. Meanwhile, Puig has reverse splits, hitting right-handed pitching better than southpaws, putting up an OPS of just .762 against the latter.

With so many left-handed hitters already on the roster for Colorado, and many of them young players who are expected to be a part of this team’s future, it makes perfect sense to add a bat who specializes in obliterating left-handed pitching but who also doesn’t demand to take up more playing time.

Even in Kemp’s broken campaign of a year ago, when he was a shell of himself at the plate, he hit .286/.333/.571 against lefties.

This will be his role for Colorado.

If the bat awakens like a sleeping giant and these splits, plus health, amount to the club having added an All-Star caliber bat, this move will look like a stroke of brilliance. If it goes the other way and it turns out Kemp’s best days are far behind him, it costs the Rockies almost nothing in terms of money, clubhouse chemistry, or the development of young players.

Adding Puig could have been a risk in all three of those categories.

With Kemp, the Rockies have themselves an incredibly low-risk addition of a high-character person who also happens to be one of the best players of the last decade, is an excellent ambassador for the game, and has extraordinary potential to help the team win baseball games.