Colorado Needs New Stirrups, Acquire Josh Outman, Offer Contract to Jamie Moyer

In a trade that seems to be more of a dare between the two clubs, the Rockies acquired the stirrup-wearing Outman and starter Guillermo Moscoso, sending fourth outfielder Seth Smith to the A’s. Smith is the classic tweener-type that Billy Beane covets— he has some speed (10 steals last season), but not enough for center, some power (15 HR), but not enough for a corner. Unfortunately, Smith’s career splits show an OPS almost .200 points higher at home and is completely lost when facing lefthanded pitching. Moving from the friendly elevation of Denver to the spacious and echoing Oakland Coliseum could be messy.

As for the Rockies, Guillermo Moscoso seems to be the exact opposite of the type of pitcher that succeeds in Colorado. Moscoso had his first full season in the Majors last year at the age of 27 and while his 3.38 ERA looks nice, there are a lot of warning signs in it. Moscoso posted the lowest groundball rate (26.8%) among all pitchers with at least 120 innings, but thanks to luck and the Oakland Coliseum, he managed to post the eighth lowest HR/FB rate at6.2%. Unless he can find a way to either strike out more batters or keep more balls out of the air, that will change quickly in the thin air at Colorado.

While Outman is a perfectly serviceable swingman, his real claim to fame, and the reason I care so deeply for this trade, are the gorgeous green-and-yellow knee high stirrups that he wore while in Oakland:

On that same note, the Rockies offered a minor league contract to the 2,000 year old man, Jamie Moyer. Moyer is currently on the mend from Tommy John surgery and is defying all odds by even drawing offers to pitch. Sadly, I can’t imagine that his 83 mph fastball and endless types of offspeed junk would be a good fit for Colorado or Colorado Springs.

As for his stirrup inclinations, just look at these beauties featuring the Liberty Bell from when he was with the Phillies:

But what are these two esteemed gentlemen of fashion going to do in Colorado? I don’t believe I’ve ever seen a stirrup sock worn by a Rockies player, but if they have it’s been the standard and boring solid black model. For a team with purple and silver in their colors, and weird space age no-sleeve tops, don’t you think they could offer something else? How about a purple sock with black stripes? Or if we want to get crazy, how about a black sock with purple mountains rising and falling around the shin?

I can only hope Bud Selig will veto any deals in the name of high fashion should the Rockies not do something to accommodate the players.

UPDATE: As Chronic-Nostalgia points out, Ubaldo Jimenez wore stirrups (how could I forget that), but sadly, they were of the plain variety: