The former top draft pick converted to the bullpen and battled his way to a big league debut.
Welcome to the 2024 edition of Ranking the Rockies, where we take a look back at every player to log playing time for the Rockies in 2024. The purpose of this list is to provide a snapshot of the player in context. The “Ranking” is an organizing principle that’s drawn from Baseball Reference’s WAR (rWAR). It’s not something the staff debated. We’ll begin with the player with the lowest rWAR and end up with the player with the highest.
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No. 24, Jaden Hill: 0.0 rWAR
It’s been an uphill battle for right-handed pitcher Jaden Hill, who was already recovering from Tommy John surgery when the Colorado Rockies drafted him in 2021 with a second round pick.
Hill didn’t make his professional debut until the following July and only pitched 17 2⁄3 innings, mostly with the Arizona Complex League Rockies. He wasn’t able to fully sink his teeth into a bigger workload until 2023, and even then he only pitched 43 2⁄3 innings with the High-A Spokane Indians over 16 starts. During that time he posted a 9.48 ERA and gave up 11 home runs, but also struck out 57 batters.
The Rockies sent Hill to the Arizona Fall League after the regular season for additional innings… and to begin his conversion to a reliever. He made 11 appearances for the Salt River Rafters—all out of the bullpen—with 13 strikeouts over 11 1⁄3 innings of work.
Hill’s move to the bullpen was a decision made from multiple angles. It could provide him with an accelerated path to the big leagues due to the Rockies’ constant need for new relievers, while also allowing his other pitches to compliment a high velocity fastball.
“This plays well to my velocity,” Hill said in spring training. “As a reliever, I don’t have to hold back as much. That’s going to make me effective. I can pitch up in the zone more. I’ve added the slider, and I’m going to use that a lot more. The changeup, I’ll use it as I need it.”
Hill also entered spring training with a positive and appreciative mindset on the struggles he has faced playing baseball.
“I genuinely love the entire process of it all — you know the ups, the downs, the struggles,” he told a crowd of listeners at Rockies Fest this January. “I’ve dealt with a lot of struggles within the game. But being able to reflect on it and learn from it and get better from it, I feel like I have such a higher place to reach, knowing that each and every day, I’m trying to build that character as a person, as a player, and put it all together. So, I genuinely love that process. Losing, it sucks. It definitely sucks. But you’ve learned so much more from it. And so you become a better person, your routine gets better. The things that you do on a day-to-day basis when you’re trying to get 1% better, they become better, they become more efficient. And so I genuinely love that entire process.”
The Rockies assigned Hill to the Double-A Hartford Yard Goats to start the season. He was effective out of the bullpen, holding a 3.52 ERA over 38 1⁄3 innings of work and 34 appearances while also earning his first six professional saves. He also balanced strikeouts with walks well, putting up a 13.1 SO9 compared to a 2.6 BB9 with 56 total strikeouts.
Hill was briefly promoted to the Triple-A Albuquerque Isotopes, but only made seven appearances there. Then the call came.
Jaden Hill made his MLB debut on September 7th against the Milwaukee Brewers. He threw 15 pitches—nine for strikes—in a scoreless inning of work. He followed up that performance with two more scoreless outings against the Detroit Tigers and Chicago Cubs.
Hill finished the season having given up seven runs (six earned) over nine appearances and 10 2⁄3 total innings of work while striking out six batters. Although it was a small sample size, he flashed the kind of potential that makes him tantalizing to the future of a young Rockies bullpen. His fastball averaged a velocity of 96.8 MPH—one of the better marks among big league pitchers—and mixed in his changeup and sweeper well.
At 24-years-old, Hill is expected to be part of the Opening Day bullpen next season as he joins a growing number of young and exciting relievers on the roster.