Rocky Results at Mile High: Colorado Rockies (Ep. 22)

Welcome back to Misery Sports Co, a leading provider of advanced analytics and disappointment regret in long term fan trauma. Here, we leverage a proprietary blend of hindsight, overreaction and unpaid labor to audit the decisions that keep teams stuck in neutral emphasis on the unpaid part. That’s right. In our last deep dive, we conducted a full postmortem on the nineteen nineties Buffalo Bills, four straight Super Bowl appearances, zero championships, and an enduring contribution to the field of existential dread. This week, we’re pivoting back to current operations, identifying inefficiencies, misaligned strategies, and value destruction at the organizational level. All of that good stuff. But before we jump into our first segment, let’s have a word from our first sponsor. This spring on NBC. It’s the game show that’s sweeping the nation for folks, young and old, men and women. Something that will bring your whole family together. 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There’s ones we don’t even know about. All right, let’s circle back and open up this week’s performance review for compliance purposes. This is where we evaluate which organizations are meeting expectations and which ones are aggressively redefining failure in a new and innovative way. Trevor, what have you got for us this week? Well, this week, uh, not much to report on the Titans except that we officially have new jerseys. And I don’t know if you’ve gotten a chance to see them, but, uh, it’s been a pretty well well received jersey. What do you what did you think of it when you saw it? Love the baby blue. Uh, a little on the fence about the logo. I love the original Titans logo. Like, it brings me back to early two thousand, but I understand. And they didn’t change it substantially, but it was enough for me to be like, this is different, but love the jerseys. They’re awesome. The jerseys are great. They really it’s a slightly different blue than the Oilers blue, but it’s very much that baby blue. It’s it pops. It’s great. I was really hoping that they would go with red face masks, but the more that I’ve sat with it, I think I think I’m on board with what they’re doing. But I agree with the logo. I’m still not in love with it because it’s white in that baby blue. And it’s just it was our they took off the flames of what we had basically. Right. Um, I don’t know. I’m still sitting with it. We’ll see. But everybody is hyped and amped. And the best part, Zach, is that Houston Texans fans are so pissed because they’re like, those are heritage. It’s like, no, that team moved to Nashville. We literally the very first season, they were the, uh, Tennessee Oilers. So like we literally played as the Oilers. That’s our heritage. I’m sorry about that. Uh, but it’s ours. Uh, and anything that makes them angry and upset, I’m here for. We, we’ve paid twenty eight players this free agency. So that that does include some resigning or some restructuring, but we’ve paid twenty eight players. We still have seventy eight million dollars in cap space. Woo. Yeah. So we’ve got some money to spend. Uh we’ll see how that goes. The Mavs are tanking. Well Hooray! It’s too painful to watch, so I haven’t watched it. Uh, they did mess around, and, yeah, they weren’t tanking on Sunday. Oh, we were texting back and forth and they. They lost to the Cavaliers the first game correctly. I think that was on that Friday. And then the Sunday they played again. And. Just leave it to the Mavs to mess around. And who was the guy that you texted me about? The Yale kid. I don’t even know his name. I couldn’t I couldn’t tell you what his name is. I don’t remember Trevor. He, uh, I’ll look up by the end of the show. Yeah, he was just stroking it from three. One of the ugliest shots I’ve ever seen. But it was all dropping for them. Um, we are up to the sixth spot in the tankathon. Okay, so doing pretty good. And from what I understand, I’m not a college basketball guy, but I think there’s eight or nine, like really good prospects that you’d be happy to have any of those. So we’re in. We’re in a good position. Uh, on the misery sadness side, a quick aside. My Twitter algorithm keeps trying to shove Luca in my face. I’m not trying to see that he’s he’s going off for the Lakers. But I don’t want to see that. Like that makes me sad. I watched his highlights from I think it was last night where he played the rockets and he was just torching them. It’s he’s flipped the switch. He’s starting to care now. And I’ve I’ve noticed this with a lot of NBA teams. It’s like the last twenty games or so. They’re like okay, we’re going to start playing now. Yeah. And he’s unreal. Yes. In twenty two and twenty four we had those kind of runs into the playoffs. And anytime there’s a fan that he’s picked out that he’s like after three pointers will turn around and yell at. You know it’s going to be a good night. Um, so I get to watch the whole crowd. Trevor. It was, it was the the city of Houston. He, every time he did something, he was just turning to him and talking so much. Miss him. That’s great. I love it. I love seeing all that. I’m not miserable at all. Uh, the stars are still winning, but, uh, they don’t really fit the misery, Bill. So thanks to the stars. How about you, Zach? What do you got this week? Well, just a recent development. So we have March Madness starting today. Actually, it’s Thursday, and, uh, first round. Always exciting. Super fun. Wouldn’t you know it, the Ohio State Buckeyes were starting the tournament off at twelve fifteen today. Yay! And, uh, they had a back and forth affair with TCU. Ended up down fifteen at halftime. Clawed all the way back. They were up four or five points with four minutes to go and completely blew the game. So nice gut punch. Uh to start the day, Honestly, I just hate being the first game in March Madness. I would much prefer to be like Friday night where you get to enjoy all the games and then your hopes and dreams get dashed. It’s not the first game of the tournament. Yeah, I’ll tell you the first four, which was awesome. But to start Thursday, brutal. That’s tough. That’s tough for the basket box. Tough way to go. Yeah. Um but some some shining stars right. So the Blue Jackets are hanging in there. Yes. They got a game in hand. Yeah. And so if they win this game. I mean they’re number one in the wild card standings. So they have scratched and clawed their way back. Let’s go. Uh really awesome story. Columbus Blue Jackets will be on our show at some point. They have a rough deep dive, but they’re putting it together this year. A former stars coach came in. It’s really lit a fire under the team. Yeah, and they’re doing great. So more to come there. Cavs got beat by the Mavs. Um, sorry about that. Yeah, we both lost. We both lost that one. The Browns is the Browns, so we’ll see. Uh, they they signed a bunch of linemen. Looks like they’re going to draft either a receiver or a lineman. They have two first round picks. We’ll cover that in April with the draft coming up. But uh yeah, more to come with the Browns. We’ll see. Nice. Well that wraps up this week’s findings. Several organizations will be placed on watch lists and others on something that probably more closely resembles life support. We’ll continue to monitor performance indicators as the seasons progress and adjust expectations downward. But before we head to the mailroom, let’s hear from our next sponsor. Have you ever hypothetically allegedly committed a crime that makes headlines? Ray Lewis Hypothetically, I definitely didn’t do it. Services teaches dramatic pauses, inspirational speeches, and in slow motion exits. Services do not cover real world consequences, viral meme creation, or the occasional reporter asking uncomfortable questions. All incidents are purely alleged. Thank you. Thank you. Ray. He didn’t do it, Trevor. He didn’t. He definitely didn’t do it. It’s all a legend. And you can’t nail him down for anything. Hell, no. All right, this. Welcome to the mailroom. The legal has asked us to clarify that no actual mail is involved. We covered this last episode, but we can’t say it legally. Legally, it doesn’t qualify as mail. It’s not. Technically, I think we can get away with a mail like product, but we’re not allowed to say mail. So, Trevor, we haven’t even asked the question why, but I can’t. We’re just not allowed. Instead, we’ve sourced a collection of public comments, complaints, and emotionally compromised takes from the internet. Zach, what do you have for us? All right. As mentioned, March Madness has started. We had the first four games in Dayton, Ohio, and so I found an awesome clip from Bleacher Report. Texas was in one of those games, very close game. They had an opportunity to hit the game. Winner Charles Barkley and Dick Vitale. Dickie V were on the call. God bless him. Uh, and this will really get you in the mood for March Madness. I watched the offensive rebound by crunch time here. Down to two mark for the lead. Oh, he hits another one. One second left. Oh come on, Mark puts Texas in front. What a wow. I freaking love it. What a treasure. What a treasure. Yeah, he’s still doing it. He can’t believe he’s around. Still. Honestly? Yeah. That’s incredible, man. Glad he’s here. Yeah. It’s like. It’s like Lee Corso in football. It’s just. Yeah, it’s one of those national treasures. Or it’s like Lou Holtz. But he’s. What? He’s gone. He’s gone. Oh, man. We’re not going down that rabbit hole. Uh. This week. The winner is from Barstool Sports. Uh, it was it was, uh, Saint Patrick’s day. Uh, this week. And if you have seen this clip, and it’s a long clip, but I’m going. To play the whole thing. It’s a newscast from twenty years ago. Trevor. Okay. Twenty. All right. So if you, you know, this this video and if you know it in our listeners, it’s time for a prostate exam, guys and gals. Okay, guys. Right. Never mind. Don’t tell me you don’t have one. Uh, probably. Guys. It’s time we don’t judge. Uh, here’s here’s Barstool sports. Well, just in time for Saint Patrick’s Day. Crowds are coming by the dozens to get an up close view at what some say is a piece of Irish folklore. Some people in the area of mobile say a car is taking up residence in their neighborhood. A leprechaun, Brian Johnson, has more curiosity leads to large crowds in mobiles. Crichton community. Many of you bringing binoculars, camcorders, even camera phones to take pictures. To me, it looks like a leprechaun to me. I got to look up in the tree. Who else in the leprechaun. Say yes. Yes. Eyewitnesses say the leprechaun only comes out at night. If you shine a light in its direction, it suddenly disappears. This cemetery sketch resembles what many horrible leprechaun looks like. Three blocks. Hard to believe and have come up with their own theories and explanations for the image. My theory is it’s casting a shadow from the other limb. Could be a crackhead got hold of the wrong stuff and told him to get up in the tree and play. We don’t get down to the bottom of this yet. Still down there, guy. Don’t be afraid. Don’t be afraid, man. This guy helping to direct traffic says he’s prepared for his encounter with the leprechaun. He suited up from head to toe. This war is officemails right here. This is a special leprechaun flute, which has been passed down from thousands of years ago, from my great great grandfather, who was Irish. He just came to help out. Others just came to get lucky in hopes a pot of gold may be buried under this tree. I’m around a backhoe and uproot that tree. I want to know where to go. I want the gold. Give me the gold. I want the gold. This is Brian Johnson, NBC fifteen news. Oh, what a classic. Holy cow. One of the OGs from YouTube. I mean, you’re talking like early two thousand. Absolutely. Fantastic. And news bloopers were a mainstay of classic YouTube. Oh, yeah. That was a big one. One of the goats. Happy Saint Patrick’s Day, everybody. Happy Saint Patty’s day. Well, um, again, we keep saying this, but I really do want to emphasize we do not talk before the show about what we are presenting. So, uh, kind of funny that you did that. So we’re all familiar now with Dick Vitale. Uh, I’ve been meaning to play this clip for a couple weeks because I think it really applies to what we’re doing here. This was a game against Kentucky, uh, and Florida, and Dick is talking about something that’s near and dear to this show’s heart. Well, I’ll tell you one thing. You don’t want to walk out of here thinking you got a moral victory. Moral victories don’t count at this level of basketball. Like hell they don’t. What else is supposed to keep me going, Dick? I need a moral victory. Um, but my tweet of the week came from, uh, at Differed Walk on. Who? We just heard basketball game from Zach’s clip. And so they were fake transcribing a portion of it. Uh, so I’ll narrate each of the pieces. Charles Barkley NC double A is a bunch of scumbags. I have a fat ass Dick Vitale. I just spoke at a funeral last week. Every person I know is dying. Brian Anderson Longhorns by five. So that’s a shout out to deferred walk on. And shout out to Dickie V doing his thing. Good for him. Legend. Absolute legend. Well that concludes this round of somewhat public input. Several contributors will not be invited back into the decision making. Legal pending. That’s right. Others will be continuing to be monitored as repeat sources of instability. Before we go to the next segment, Trevor, who’s our next sponsor? Hey, you. Yeah, you. How’s that DraftKings account looking? Did that eight leg parlay? Excuse me? That octopus hit. Are you getting boat raced in your work bracket? Well, here’s the help you need with Anderson Varejao. Reality check. Fortune cookies guaranteed to have a biting dose of. Wait the up in every serving. Crack open a cookie and read things like you’re bad at this or just because you watched this Atlantic ten team warm up does not mean you can tell who’s playing injured. And now get our special edition NFL draft cookies with fortunes like, no, that’s six round. Safety is not going to save your franchise. You’re still a good ten pieces away from average. Doug. Act now and one lucky customer will receive the first ever gold plated fortune given to Anderson almost twenty years ago that read, hey, pass it to LeBron. Pass it back to LeBron, you genius. With Anderson Varejao. Reality check. Fortune cookie. That’s too soon. Uh, Anderson Varejao, Cleveland Cavalier for life. I guess he kind of bailed for Golden State, but, uh, who among us we will accept your your sponsorship, no less. Thank you. Sir, we now transition to a high growth area of the business. reframing outcomes. This is the moral victories division. No matter how much Dick Vitale says, it doesn’t exist where results are negotiable, but effort is aggressively highlighted. All right, Trevor, who do you have for our employee of the week? So last week, it was the guy in the crowd singing Goo Goo Dolls at the top of his lungs. And I really enjoyed him. He was an all timer. So shout out this week. It is none other than the Dallas Stars starting goalie Jake Oettinger, who was this past week, the NHL’s second star. So they recognized three top players every week and he was their second star. He had three wins, no losses, had a two six, five goals against average. But most importantly, last night we played. The Dallas Stars are in second place in the league, second place in our division, and they played the top team in the Colorado Avalanche. He only gave up one goal in Colorado and helped the Dallas Stars move into only two points behind the avalanche, with something like a dozen games left. So it’s still possible to get that top spot and avoid the Minnesota Wild in the first round, which would be great. So shout out to Jake Oettinger. We appreciate you. Otter. That’s what’s up. My employee of the week. So Trevor you asked who is that Dallas Mavericks player that tanked all over the Cavaliers. And I lied. I know who it is. Oh, it’s John Poulakidas of the Dallas Mavericks. In his second game ever for the Mavericks he showed up. Laced him up against the Cleveland Cavaliers. Shot sixty seven percent from the field fifty percent from three. It was only ten points, but he. In the third quarter I thought couldn’t miss. I don’t know what was going on. They beat the Cavs one thirty to one twenty. Dumb John. Paola Kiedis he sounds like someone that Giannis Antetokounmpo yells at on the Greece team to shoot more. I don’t know. Yeah I don’t know exactly what that sounds like. Yes shoot the ball John man. Shout out yes. Nice win. Congratulations. Love to love to recognize. Those findings will be circulated as this week’s internal winners recognition has been issued. Expectations have been adjusted and accountability has been deferred. Before we head into the deep dive, a word from our last sponsor. Here we go. From the executive producers of Gold Rush moonshiners. Alaskan bush people. An expedition. Bigfoot. Discovery channel presents. Chasing bliss. An epic quest where Zach and Trevor risk everything to discover bliss, a colour that has never been seen before by human eyes. Through treacherous mountains, storm tossed seas and uncharted jungles. No map and no rules stand in their way. Dodging rockslides, diving into turquoise waters and braving the unknown. They chase the impossible. A colour that shouldn’t exist. Exhausted, exhilarated and relentless, their journey will push them to the edge of imagination. Chasing bliss. Only on discovery. Oh yeah. It’s here. Chasing blip in a screen near you. Oh my God, Cliff. We have been talking about Cliff for, oh, coming up on twenty years. Oh, yeah. Easy. Like easy. What if there was a color that shouldn’t exist? But we found it. Yeah, it’s outside of the color wheel. You wouldn’t know it until you see it. You can’t describe it. It it is totally. It’s a new color. And we’re gonna find it and we’re gonna explore the world on discoveries. Check. So thank you, discovery for the sponsorship. Just who wouldn’t want to watch us travel around the world and explain to different peoples of the world that. No, we’re looking for a new color. The confusion on their faces as our poor interpreter has to translate everything we need to go through the Amazon rainforest. That’s where we start. Where? Blips in there. I know, I know, it’s in there. It’s probably under a tree. Maybe in a cave. Oh tune in, I love it. Heck yes. I’m so glad that made it to the pod. Thank you. Chasing bliss for your sponsorship. So glad you made it to air. Can’t wait to watch the first episode and be a part of that. But now it is time for the deep dive. This is where we stop reacting and start digging. Take one organization, strip away all the noise, and examine the full operational miserable picture. And that’s right, Trevor. The operational picture for this team is bleak. Um, we are going to cover them very briefly. Uh, they are in the MLB and it is none other than the Colorado Rockies. Colorado Rockies, founded in nineteen ninety three in Denver, Colorado. That’s it. Uh, with. Yeah. nineteen ninety three. What? So they came in with the Florida Marlins. Now Miami Marlins. Ooh. Yep. Close to the Rocky Mountains. So they were like, hey, let’s let’s call it the Rockies. Okay. And they actually had a really good start, like from an attendance and an operational perspective. They were number one in attendance for the first five years. They come out. Wow. Holy cow. Real hot. People are amped. Triple A team. I thought this was just funny. Albuquerque isotopes. Uh, isotopes is a chemistry term. Same number of protons, but different number of neutrons. Okay. And Albuquerque for bliss. We got the Albuquerque isotopes out here. Are you kidding me? Geez, we’re gonna find bliss. We will find it. It will happen. A peek behind the curtain for our listeners. My wife hates it. Hates it when we talk about bliss, which. Which makes us talk about it more. So I can’t wait till she hears this. Oh, man. So looking overall at the Rockies, right. So everybody’s excited. Number one in attendance in the MLB for the first five years from nineteen ninety three to today. They have made the postseason five times. Oh that’s good. They made it to the World Series once. Holy cow. Yeah. Made it to the World Series once in two thousand and seven. Completely swept by the Boston Red Sox. They have Trevor. They have never won their division in those years since nineteen ninety three. Oh my gosh. Their all time record is basically forty six percent win percentage. So two thousand three hundred wins, two thousand seven hundred losses. Um, brutal. Yeah. The only person that I really remember right when we were playing those old video games on N64 was Todd Helton the only one that you pitched away from him because he would crush it. He would absolutely crush it. You’re not pitching to Todd Helton. Dang, that is so sad. I mean, that’s a really tough division with the Dodgers and the Giants. Like those were some good teams out there. So I guess that part makes sense. The Diamondbacks won a World Series in their damn five times in thirty three years. That’s tough. And you would think like you would look into it kind of like the Diamondbacks, right, where you just assemble a super team randomly and then they’d get bought out. But it never happened. Five postseason appearances. Brutal. Yeah, that’s that’s tough. I remember Todd Helton. I remember, um, Troy Tulowitzki that comes to mind. He was great. But in terms of other big Rocky names, I got nothing for you. No. So they are welcome in Misery Sports co. tough if you’re a Rockies fan. God bless you. Uh, we have our own teams very similar to that. They do not produce. And that’s what you know, Missouri Sports Co is all about is finding these teams, finding these fan bases, giving you a salute because there’s just it’s been bleak. I hope that this year is better, but looking at the pattern doesn’t look great. Probably not. But good for them starting a team and having such high attendance at the start. At least if I mean, doesn’t it help? Wouldn’t you say that it helps to at least pack the stadium for Browns fans and see them go crazy every game? That has to, no doubt. Yeah, there’s a lot of passion now. Did, uh, Denver’s attendance after those first five years follow? Maybe not, but yeah, we’ll see. If you build a winner, they will come. Yeah, right. You just need competitive baseball. And I feel like you need. I always Was it either Mike Piazza baseball or Ken Griffey baseball, one of the two? I think it was Piazza. I would play in that stadium a lot because I feel like they had like a forest scene in the outfield bleachers. Like they had a really cool stadium. Like Kansas City was the goat for me because they had a waterfall. Like I loved the waterfall. It was so cool. But I, I distinctly remember Colorado having like a cool nature scene out there or something. So at least they had a cool stadium. They got that going. Yeah. And I think if you were there as a home fan, you saw more home runs. I think that, yeah, the stadium was designed in such a way that there were more home runs naturally. But then also being in Denver a mile high, right, you’re going to hit more homers. So Paul’s going to go. It’s more entertaining. Yeah Paul’s going to go. So that is the Colorado Rockies. Well thanks for that deep dive Zach. Some answers were found. I don’t think the fans found very many and continue to search for answers. Yeah, it’s a little rough. Uh. That wraps this week’s episode though, where expectations were missed, explanations were stretched and accountability remained optional. We’ll continue tracking developments, compiling data, and questioning how any of this makes sense. Join us next week for more findings. Fewer answers in the same underlying issues. And don’t forget to follow us on Twitter. Hit a subscription at your Apple Podcasts, Pocket Casts, Spotify, you name it. Give us a subscribe, say hey and remember, performance is temporary, but misery lasts a lifetime.