WARNING: I am talking about baseball here

I'm pretty sure that no one who will read this cares about baseball, but I need to rant...

While not on the same level as the Broncos or Avs, I've been a fairly big Rockies fan since they came into existence back in 1993. For a long while after that, most fans in Denver were simply happy to have a professional baseball team and didn't particularly care that the team wasn't any good. The team was entertaining to watch, and due to the thin air of Denver, finals scores at Mile High Stadium and Coors field often more closely resembled football scores than baseball ones. Sandwiched in between several losing seasons, we even had one wild card berth to cling to. Besides, we could always take solace in the fact that at least we weren't the Montreal Expos.

Finally however, after about a decade dominated largely by futility, fans finally had enough and stopped coming in droves to Rockies games. In the first couple years of their existence, 76,000 people would cram into Mile High Stadium to see a game. That enthusiasm carried over to Coors Field, where their brand new 45,000 seat stadium was consistently full. From about 2002 to late 2007 however, the Rockies poor play often resulted in them playing in front of sparse crowds. High priced free agents like Mike Hampton and Denny Neagle were brought in to try to solve the team's woes, but these attempts ended up being spectacular failures.

Woeful as these years may have been though, Rockies' ownership kept telling the fans to be patient. Aside from veteran mainstay Todd Helton, the Rockies had many young promising players like Jeff Francis, Aaron Cook, Brad Hawpe, Garret Hopkins, and a very talented young left fielder named Matt Holliday. As difficult as it was for fans to buy into to this plea for patience, it was obvious that if these players developed and matured and predicted, it wouldn't be long before the team started to improve.

Finally in 2007, the payoff happened. The team muddled through the first 3/4 of the year, hovering around the .500 mark for most of the year before finally catching fire in September, sweeping their way through the NLDS and NLCS, before finally running out of steam against a superior team in the World Series. Though their incredible run was great team effort, there was no question that Matt Holliday was the catalyst. He had clearly supplanted Helton as the best player on the team, and finished second in a very close race for National League MVP. Rockies owners Dick and Charlie Monfort took the World Series appearance as evidence that their plan had worked. Their young players, led by Holliday, had matured and turned the team into a championship contender.

Then 2008 came around and due to injuries, sub-par play, and perhaps heightened expectations, the Rockies faltered. After this disappointing season ended, the scapegoating began. The Monforts publicly blamed the Rockies poor season on the alleged distraction that Matt Holiday's contract situation had brought. Holliday's contract was set to expire after the 2009 season, and it was expected he would command a contract of well over $100 million when he became a free agent. It was pretty widely known that the Rockies were not willing to pay this high price tag.

Well, the Rockies put and end to the distraction yesterday by trading Holliday to Oakland for three players of little to no repute. Perhaps one or two of them will become serviceable players, but the chances of any of them becoming stars of Holliday's stature are remote at best. The poster child for the team's master plan is gone. Fans had been told for years to be patient, because players like Matt Holliday will become superstars before long and the team will start winning. Well, finally that did happen, and they decided to trade him rather than pay him.

You can't have it both ways, Rockies! You can't tell fans to be patient and wait for these young players to get good, and then trade them for cheaper players when they do. From all indications, Garrett Atkins will be the next one to be traded. Ownership obviously has no real desire to build a winning team. If they want to be a franchise that is interested only in turning a profit, then fine. There are lots of owners is sports with that philosophy. In the end, sports are a business and if making money is your only true goal, then I am ok with that. What I am not ok with is claiming that you are trying to build a winner, only to dismantle it when it gets too expensive.

Dick and Charlie Monfort are thieves, liars and frauds. The Rockies are headed right back to obscurity and futility where they belong. Until they get different ownership, the Colorado Rockies will always be a major league joke.

http://sportsillustrated.cnn.com/2008/baseball/mlb/11/12/bp.hollidaytrade/index.html