Rockies left-hander Austin Gomber will be placed on the 15-day injured list prior to Opening Day, Patrick Saunders of the Denver Post reports. It might just be a fairly minimal stint, but the placement reflects the left shoulder soreness that has held Gomber back for the last two weeks.
The southpaw threw two scoreless innings in his only Cactus League appearance of the spring, though Gomber’s velocity was slightly down and his shoulder continued to feel sore in the lead-up to his next planned outing, which ended up being scratched. Rox manager Bud Black told reporters (including Patrick Lyons of Just Baseball Media) last Monday that Gomber received an injection to deal with the discomfort. Gomber is back on the mound, with MLB.com’s Rockies injury report noting that Gomber is planned to throw two innings in a minor league game today, and then three innings in a Cactus League game on Saturday.
While Gomber is slated to be part of Colorado’s rotation, the team has off-days on both April 1 and 7. As Lyons noted, the Rockies were already considering just using four starters in the early going, since by using just one game as a bullpen day, a proper fifth starter won’t be needed until the third week of the season. This would give Gomber time to recover while missing barely any time.
Gomber had a 5.08 ERA over 544 innings with the Rockies over the last four seasons, including a 4.75 ERA in a career-high 165 frames last year. While the overall results haven’t been great, Gomber’s ability to eat innings has been valuable to a Rockies team that has had to deal with a ton of pitching injuries in recent years. Gomber himself hasn’t been immune, as he missed time with back issues in both 2021 and 2023.
Kyle Freeland, German Marquez, Antonio Senzatela, and Ryan Feltner are lined up to join Gomber in the rotation when everyone is healthy. The Rockies finished at or near the bottom of most pitching categories in 2024, but the hope is that Marquez and Senzatela can provide some help now that they’re hopefully recovered from long-term injury absences.