SCOTTSDALE, Ariz. -- The Rockies¡¯ top Draft choice in 2016 (and the No. 4 overall pick), right-handed pitcher Riley Pint has come back to the club wearing a bushy mustache -- one his teammates needle him about and, he says, his girlfriend hates.

But what matters is what¡¯s beneath the bushy brown bristles that ranged from lip corner to lip corner: A big ol' smile.

And when he flashed the smile matters. It was after facing hitters Wednesday morning -- his first such foray since June 2 last year while with High-A Spokane. Shortly thereafter, Pint filed retirement papers and left the club, thereby leaving the organization. Wednesday¡¯s session featured some electric fastballs and sliders, and no more pitches pulled and bounced that anyone else in a first live batting practice. It was a first step in a journey no one can predict.

But Pint (listed at 6-foot-5), who towers above most from a height he says is 6-foot-7, smiled down, so things just may be looking up.

¡°That¡¯s what I said: 'New year, new me.' And the 'stache comes along with it,¡± Pint said.

Pint, 24, has a career record of 4-20 with a 5.56 ERA in 68 games, including 40 starts. He has amassed 134 walks, which puts a damper on his 163 strikeouts in 166 2/3 innings.

Before wildness became his story, Pint famously threw 100-plus-mph fastballs while at St. Thomas Aquinas High School in Overland Park, Kan. His painstaking development was part of "The Arm: Inside the Billion-Dollar Mystery of the Most Valuable Commodity in Sports," authored by Jeff Passan. It all led to a $4.8 million signing bonus.

There were extreme difficulties in throwing balls where Pint intended. Although there were a couple of injuries (forearm, oblique) early in his career, the control worried everyone involved. But interestingly, Pint said Wednesday that the poor statistics on the field were less a problem than the sense he had to live up to the velocity and the arm people write books about.

¡°To be honest, I was kind of happy with the on-the-field stuff,¡± said Pint, who was 1-0 with a 3.38 ERA in 10 relief appearances covering 10 2/3 innings -- with 17 strikeouts, 10 walks and a hit batter -- at Spokane before leaving the club. ¡°My second-to-last outing, I went two innings and struck out five.

¡°I just knew something wasn¡¯t right with the entire part of me. I just needed to take some time to find out what that was, what was missing. It was really good to be back with family and just re-center myself. I was all over the board, very scatterbrained all the time. That wasn¡¯t how I wanted to feel.¡±

Rockies player development director Chris Forbes, the assistant under Zach Wilson at the time Pint left, stayed in touch with Pint.

¡°I felt when it happened, that wasn¡¯t the end of this,¡± Forbes said. ¡°Fantastic kid, unbelievable teammate -- guys love him, absolutely adore Riley.

¡°I knew we would get a phone call.¡±

But Pint took time to enjoy life before calling to say he was back in.

¡°I did not throw a single ball until the first time I picked up a ball in December,¡± Pint said. ¡°I did a lot of traveling. I was in Pinedale, Wyo., for awhile.

"Weird story: my best friend¡¯s parents bought a resort there, so we went. There¡¯s not much there. There¡¯s a resort that¡¯s on a lake, and that¡¯s where we stayed, probably in June or July. We had a couple of other trips. We went to New York City. We went to Vail, [Colo.,] for a week. We hit different spots, me and my girlfriend.¡±

It was all a part of Pint¡¯s successful quest to ¡°re-find the love¡± of baseball.

¡°Riley expressed an interest in coming back, and our staff talked to him a few times,¡± said Rockies general manager Bill Schmidt, who made the call to take Pint so high in the Draft. ¡°He decided to make a go at it.¡±

But Pint didn¡¯t commit until after delving into his off-season program. He wanted to know the feelings were real.

Pint enlisted plenty of help. Harvey Martin, a sports psychologist with the Giants, suggested something simple as ¡°just being out in the sunshine.¡± Throwing sessions with one of Pint's best friends, Tigers' No. 13 prospect Joey Wentz, left him feeling happy with his progress.

Former All-Star catcher Jason Kendall, a neighbor who caught Pint's bullpen sessions going into 2021, gave him valuable, no-nonsense advice.

¡°He has an old-school way of thinking,¡± Pint said of Kendall. ¡°That¡¯s how I came back. I¡¯m worried about this, this, this, and he¡¯s telling me, ¡®Who cares? Just go out, have fun, play the game again.¡¯"

Pint¡¯s MLB Pipeline rankings topped out at No. 51 overall in 2017, and No. 3 in the Rockies¡¯ system. He wishes he¡¯d cared less then.

¡°After that first full season in [Class A] Asheville [in 2017], what I wish I would have done differently, I didn¡¯t,¡± Pint said. ¡°I just kept in that same mode: ¡®I need to be this prospect.¡¯ But at the end of the day, it doesn¡¯t matter.¡±

For a sunny Arizona day, all the rankings, hype and stats melted away in the warmth of Pint¡¯s mustachioed smile.