Sam Hilliard designated for assignment by Rockies
Mar 27, 2025, 11:06 AM | Updated: 11:07 am
(Photo by Justin Edmonds/Getty Images)
(Photo by Justin Edmonds/Getty Images)
Sam Hilliard had a rotten month-plus in the Cactus League, and as a result, he’ll find himself somewhere other than the Colorado Rockies’ dugout when the team opens its season at Steinbrenner Field in Tampa on Friday.
The Rockies will designate Hilliard for assignment. Patrick Saunders of The Denver Post was first to report the move.
It comes after the Rockies signed outfielder Mickey Moniak to a one-year, $1.25-million deal late Wednesday. The No. 1 overall pick in the 2016 draft, Moniak was released by the Los Angeles Angels of Anaheim on Tuesday in the wake of a rough spring in which he batted .191.
Moniak posted an .802 OPS and a 2.2 WAR (per Baseball Reference) as recently as 2023, but struggled last year as his OPS plunged to .646 and his average dropped to .219.
Sam Hilliard, meanwhile, logged a 0.5 WAR and an .812 OPS in 2024. The latter figure was his highest for a single season since the COVID-19-truncated 2020 campaign in which he had just 87 plate appearances. But strikeout rate has always been a concern for Hilliard; even last year, it was 35.4 percent.
It got worse in the Cactus League this year.
Sam Hilliard struck out in 48.2 percent of his plate appearances — the worst rate among 546 players with at least 30 spring-training plate appearances. A .137 average and a .489 OPS over the last month-plus exacerbated matters.
When Bud Black noted Zac Veen’s strikeout rate in explaining why the outfield prospect and 2020 first-round pick was optioned to AAA Albuquerque for more seasoning while Sam Hilliard was kept on the major-league roster, eyebrows arched, especially given knowledge of Hilliard’s rough spring.
That said, Moniak has a career strikeout rate of 32.3 percent — although his percentage of 27.3 last year was the best of his career. And his career rate is better than Hilliard’s 34.1-percent figure.
Thus, Bud Black will look for something different for outfield depth beyond the young, homegrown trio of Brenton Doyle, Jordan Beck and Sean Bouchard that the club would like to see blossom.
