The Colorado Rockies

It was so wild in LoDo Sunday and Monday, I bet the Denver Police had to call in the reserves.




So the Rockies open post-season play, I just talked about baseball in October wow, Wednesday afternoon against the Phillies. But instead of previewing what should be an explosive series between two high powered, star heavy lineups, it's time to give some love to the guys that made it happen.

1. Matt Holliday; Never in my wildest dreams did I think Holliday was going to be this type of club-carrying superstar this season. The kind of player that can botch a ball in the outfield in the 8th inning and find a way to come thru with a game-tying triple in the 13th inning.
2. Todd Helton; There will never be a more clear moment when a team goes from being a wannabe to a contender then Todd Helton's 9th inning bomb off of Takashi Saito against the Dodgers in the night game of the Sept 18th doubleheader. It changed the course of the season and united this city behind a team that suddenly didn't look too young to win with their veteran leader steaming around the bases pumping his fists.
3. Troy Tulowitzki; The "can't miss" shortstop prospect was even better then advertised, almost from day one, but the biggest thing about Tulo is he got better in every single area of his game the entire season. Instead of tailing off in his first 162 game season, he was a leader and helped drive this incredible run.
4. Garrett Atkins and Brad Hawpe; Almost by sheer lack of coverage these two guys are anonymous even to most Denver sports' fans. But how's 54 HR's and 227 RBI's do ya? On June 1st, Garrett Atkins was hitting .223. He finished at .301 after another big-time productive play-in game against the Padres. And Hawpe's just a terrific right fielder who continues to drive in runs and go deep far more often then the skinny kid from LSU looks like he should be able to.
5. Jeff Francis; When the team was struggling to stay in this thing it was Francis' emergence as a legitimate #1 that kept the Rox afloat after the 1-9 disaster at mid-season. The team went 22-12 in Francis' 34 starts, 68-61 in the other 129 games.
6. Brian Fuentes & Manny Corpas; You get to the 8th inning now and you don't feel terrified, you feel confident. Two legit all-star quality arms at the back end of every close game is a luxury the Rockies have never had.

And there's a whole host of role players like Josh Fogg, Yorvitt Torrealba, LaTroy Hawkins, Jeremy Affeldt, Ryan Spillborgs, Kaz Matsui and young players like Ubaldo Jimenez, Franklin Morales, Ian Stewart, and Joe Koshansky that will get opportunities in the next couple of weeks to make this run more then something to just look back and smile about.

And that brings me to point #1. Everything that happens from here on out is NOT gravy. The Colorado Rockies have a legit shot at winning a World Series, as bizarre and wrong as that just sounds, it's 100% true. And they need to be thinking about nothing else but winning the whole fuckin' thing. If you doubt me, the 1994 Denver Nuggets would certainly back me up. It's been 13 years, and the Nuggets still haven't won another playoff series. Maybe it's the start of several playoff runs, maybe it's not. But they need to treat this like it's the only shot they'll ever get.