Lawrence turns to analytics in hopes of regaining full pitch arsenal?

DENVER -- Rockies righty reliever Justin Lawrence took the offseason as a quest to regain his form and dispense with the tinkering that led him on a path to nowhere last season.

Lawrence, 30, went from a 3.72 ERA and some standout stretches in 2023 to 6.49 in ‘24. Even though the Rockies began last season with him as their closer, Lawrence was already searching for form and confidence.

“My mentality is which one was the fluke year?” said Lawrence, who signed for one year at $745,000 to avoid arbitration. “Was ‘23 the good fluke year or was ‘24 the bad fluke year? Let’s make ‘24 the bad fluke year and show that I deserve to be here and play this game for a lot longer.”

Lawrence throws a changeup once in a while and he has added a four-seam fastball, but his main pitches, from a low-arm slot, are a hard sinker and a sweeper that he said “put me on the map in ‘23, and in ‘24 it was kind of useless.”

With a goal of having both regular-season ready as soon as Cactus League play begins, Lawrence reached out to pitching analytics experts, especially those he follows on Instagram.

One was Cole Newell, a former Emporia State pitcher and current partner with Rapsodo Baseball, which offers technology and expert advice based on data. Through comparing Baseball Savant and other data readings, and comparing video of game and bullpen sessions, Newell and Lawrence arrived at a simple adjustment.

“We noticed it was releasing off his index finger more,” Newell said. “From his arm angle, you have to be so precise because it’s so low. When it came off his index finger, he wasn’t getting the spin and the profile that he wanted, and it was changing the seam orientation of the ball.

“So, I was like, ‘Let’s try this in your next bullpen session. Concentrate on your middle finger more.’”

Newell said the extreme movement, similar to 2023, returned.

Rockies manager Bud Black commended Lawrence for taking ownership of his struggles.

“[Lawrence’s] inconsistency and a lot of times overanalyzing got himself in a pickle,” Black said. “The more he fought to get out of it, the worse it got. But he’s got such good stuff, and we’ve seen dominant stretches of performances. It still leads me to believe that it’s in there to have a big year.”

Embracing the role

After a strong 2024, catcher Jacob Stallings signed for one year, plus a mutual 2026 option. It’s possible that the 35-year-old could be sharing the position with one of the younger catchers who saw time in the Majors last season -- Hunter Goodman, who was a rookie, and Drew Romo, who was called up in August.

The 25-year-old Goodman marveled at Stallings’ temperament.

“His on-the-field stuff is great, but he’s an awesome human being and he stays level-headed all the time,” Goodman said.

Stallings called his calm a learned trait.

“I don’t think my college coaches [at North Carolina] would say I was super even keeled,” Stallings said, chuckling. “It’s just something I’ve learned. There’s really no benefit from getting too high or too low.”

Romo, 23, was called up for the final month and a half as the second-youngest catcher in the Majors. The Rockies limited Romo, ranked as the club's No. 8 prospect by MLB Pipeline, to 16 games, but they had him spend the hours before the game working on fundamentals and studying the mental part.

“I just tried to support him,” Stallings said. “He asked me a lot of questions. We had a lot of good conversations. I didn’t want to overwhelm him with things. He was getting a lot of coaching and trying to learn a pitching staff. I wanted to be a resource for him.”

Swing on by

Romo’s girlfriend works in Washington, D.C., and Rockies center fielder Brenton Doyle lives not far away, in Virginia. When Doyle extended an invitation to offseason training and hitting, Romo readily accepted it. Right-handed relief prospect Zach Agnos and recent amateur signee Everett Catlett, a lefty pitcher from Georgetown University, also worked with Doyle.

After seeing the right-handed-hitting Doyle go from a .203 average with a .593 OPS as a rookie in 2023 to .260/.784 last year, the switch-hitting Romo figured he could learn.

“I really like how short and quick he is to the ball,” Romo said. “He’s a very strong guy. We have different bodies -- he’s taller and leaner, and I’ve got more of a catcher’s body. But he doesn’t have to [add extra movement to] generate that power. It’s the same for me.”