Bud Black Fired

Per the Colorado Rockies Organization on Sunday- “The Colorado Rockies announced today that they have relieved Bud Black of his duties as manager and Mike Redmond of his duties as bench coach. Current Third Base Coach Warren Schaeffer has been named the interim manager through the end of the 2025 season, and current Hitting Coach Clint Hurdle has been named the interim bench coach.”

The Colorado Rockies have finally done it! Bud Black was removed from the managerial position following Sunday’s 9-3 win over the San Diego Padres. Don’t let the once in a blue moon win hide the fact that it ended the third separate eight-game losing streak and a 21-0 loss Saturday night.

Bud Black has been the Rockies manager since the 2017 season, where he managed the team to their first postseason berth since 2009. After back-to-back seasons of playoff contention, the Rockies fell to 20 games below .500, a spot they’ve only surpassed once since then (not including 2020). Bud Black finished his Rockies tenure with a 543-690 record with only one playoff win.

Initially, you couldn’t put the blame on Buddy. He was losing his star players left and right and was forced to manage a rebuild team instead of a playoff-hungry team. However,  when the game started to evolve and change, Buddy’s managerial style stayed the same, and that’s when the blame was shifted onto him. I think his pitching background allowed Buddy to keep the job for as long as he did.  Everyone knows pitchers struggle at Coors Field, and having a former pitcher manage the team looks good on paper. Sadly, the transition onto the field was not there for Bud and the Rockies.

Bud Black was always a bright face in the locker room. Players like German Marquez struggled with the announcement today. “It’s kind of hard, man. It’s been a lot of time and a lot of years with that guy,” Marquez said postgame. Marquez mentioned that he, Kyle Freeland, Antonio Senzatela, and Ryan McMahon have all been with Buddy since his first Rockies season in 2017. To the players, Buddy was the guy they could go to for help, but the product on the field didn’t show any behind-the-scenes communication.

After a while, the games got stale. The young guys weren’t being given opportunities, and there was no improvement. The records got worse and worse, the losing streaks got longer and longer, and the displeasure started showing more and more each day.

This move will hopefully usher in a new era at 20th & Blake. We know it won’t start immediately, but this is a start. Beginning to make bigger moves like this shows some type of life. It may not be much, but it’s something. It’s also more than this team has done in years.

As Warren Schaeffer takes over this club, we could see some changes to the lineups and the bullpen moves, but it will take some time to see a change in the win column. Keeping Clint Hurdle on the bench is a move that very few wanted to see, but maybe the consistency will be just enough for this season. I hope to see someone like Gabe Kapler in the managerial spot next season, because, as proven in 2021, he can take a low-level team and hand them a division title.

Who knows, maybe this will be the move to spark the Rockies and push them a little harder. I doubt it, but you never know. All we can do as fans is try to continue forward with this team. Hopefully this move by Dick Monfort awakened something in him, and he decides to actually run the team now, but for now, we sit, and we wait. Anyway you slice it, the Rockies have made a managerial move, and it could not have been more necessary.