Tovar bridging gap between Rockies' present, future

DENVER -- Rockies manager Bud Black has a tricky balance to strike when thinking about his ballclub. Saturday night’s 4-2, 10-inning loss to the Tigers at Coors Field, as well as what preceded it, gave us a tidy example of the delicate yet critical exercise he must constantly undertake.

“I think about the future all the time,” Black said. “I think about the present all the time.”

Therein lies the tension of the 2023 Colorado Rockies: The future is now, especially after injuries have ravaged the roster and sidelined a number of veterans. But now isn’t so great. Then again, the future, at times, seems bright.

The game itself told us as much. Right-hander Peter Lambert took the baseball to open a bullpen effort against Detroit, making his first start in 641 days. He pitched well, tossing three scoreless innings and passing the baton to left-hander Ty Blach, who turned in 2 1/3 scoreless frames. Righty Matt Koch got the final two outs of the sixth with some help from his rookie shortstop.

That’s where the present briefly touched the future. With runners at the corners and two outs in a scoreless affair, the Tigers’ Matt Vierling hit a soft ground ball toward short. Charging in came 21-year-old Ezequiel Tovar, the face of Colorado’s youth movement, with Vierling trying to leg out an infield hit that would give his club the lead.

Tovar, as he has done so many times already this year, made a difficult play look easy, throwing out Vierling to end the threat and preserve the scoreless tie.

A few minutes later, Tovar delivered an RBI single to right field with two outs in the bottom of the sixth to put the Rockies ahead, nine outs from victory. It also extended his current hitting streak to 14 games and continued a particularly strong stretch at the plate since late May. And he did it all like he’s been doing it for years.

But then the present reared its merciless head.

Jake Bird, a workhorse all season to this point, entered his 40th game of the 2023 campaign and promptly gave up a leadoff single to Miguel Cabrera in the seventh, and after a pinch-runner replaced the future Hall of Famer, a game-tying double by Jonathan Schoop.

The contest remained knotted at 1 until the top of the 10th, when a sturdy Rockies bullpen effort to that point crumbled. Reliever Pierce Johnson surrendered a three-run homer to Zach McKinstry that proved to be the decisive blow.

The present: a deflating loss.

The future? Let’s rewind a bit.

Prior to the game, Rockies second baseman Brendan Rodgers took another step forward in his recovery from a Spring Training shoulder injury. He took batting practice on the field, adding to his regimen of taking ground balls and participating in other baseball activities.

He'll head to Arizona for extended spring training after the All-Star break. If all goes well, the next step is a Minor League rehab assignment, and, according to Black, potential activation from the injured list sometime in August.

Rodgers hasn’t played an inning during this regular season, which means the 2022 National League Gold Glove Award winner hasn’t had a chance to work up the middle with Tovar in games that count.

All Tovar has done in Rodgers’ absence is flash the type of defense a future Gold Glove Award winner at shortstop might display. The idea of them being double-play partners is tantalizing.

“Since Spring Training, we’ve been constantly talking about the middle infield and working together,” Tovar said through an interpreter. “We constantly communicate. Whether it’s about what kind of throws he likes at second base [or anything else].”

Perhaps Black allows himself, at times, to dream a bit about a return to a rich Rockies tradition of stellar infield defense with Tovar and Rodgers later this season. He even coined a phrase that, if it eventually takes on its intended meaning, will indicate the future is working out the way the Rockies hoped it would.

“There’s a great legacy, especially the last 20 years, of Rockies shortstops,” he said. “Tulowitzki, Story, and now into potentially a Tovar era.”

One dares to dream, but reality has a way of snapping you back to the present. It did so for the Rockies on Saturday, which reminds us that Black still has to think about the now, too.

“I think about a lot of things a lot of the time, all the time,” Black said. “That’s what we do.”