DENVER -- Rockies No. 14 prospect Gabriel Hughes, a right-handed pitcher who was the team’s top Draft pick in 2022, experienced a stop sign on what looked like a quick trip to the Majors last season. But it may have been the pause Hughes needed.
Hughes missed the 2024 Minor League season because of Tommy John right elbow surgery, but he bounced back with strong work at Double-A Hartford -- a 3.07 ERA with a .184 batting average against and a 0.85 WHIP in nine starts before being promoted to Triple-A Albuquerque on May 31. But right shoulder fatigue set in four starts into his Triple-A time, causing him to miss a month.
After his return in mid-July, Hughes posted a 3.72 ERA over his final 10 Triple-A starts. He didn’t receive a promotion, but he put himself in position for Tuesday’s news. Hughes, 24, was added to the Rockies’ 40-man Major League roster before the deadline for protecting players from the Rule 5 Draft.
More importantly, Hughes used his season-ending performance as a study in pitching at altitude. If the lessons he learned in pitch usage at altitude versus sea level stay with him, it could help him earn his debut and, more importantly, allow him to thrive at the start of his Major League career.
“Everybody wants to be in the Major Leagues,” Hughes said. “But one of the biggest things the year taught me was patience. I look back, and this September was the best string of starts that I put together all year.”
In Colorado's current projected 2026 rotation, only lefty Kyle Freeland and righty Ryan Feltner have as much as two years of service time. Everyone else was a rookie in 2025, so Hughes enters the new year with an opportunity.
The late-season education process was not only valuable, but it was rare for the Rockies in 2025.
As the Rockies went 43-119, an organization that aspired to a draft-and-develop philosophy lived a draft-and-promote reality. That is especially dangerous for an organization that largely relies on its drafted or signed pitchers.
A plan to allow 2023 top pick Chase Dollander to acclimate himself to altitude at Albuquerque was scrapped after one start -- not even in Albuquerque -- before he was forced into the rotation. As injuries and struggles affected the rotation, the Rockies called up righty McCade Brown directly from Hartford late in the year. Like the rest of the team, pitchers were often starting games because there wasn’t another option.
The unintended benefit of Hughes’ injury -- believed to be caused by an urge to change his arm slot that’s common among pitchers after Tommy John surgery -- was that Hughes was not in position to be forced to the Majors.
But there are constant adjustments between home and road, and pitchers of all ilk are required to overcome the inevitable bad numbers that happen because of decreased pitch movement, increased distance on some batted balls and bloops that land in an expansive outfield.
The place isn’t impossible. In many cases, though, pitching for Albuquerque is just as hard. The quality of the opponent isn’t the same, but the altitude at Isotopes Park and other Pacific Coast League venues can be problematic.
So while he was in Triple-A, Hughes sought out former Rockies reliever and current Minor League pitching coordinator Scott Oberg and others who have pitched at Coors Field. He applied the information to his strategy in Triple-A.
“It was asking questions for guidance,” Hughes said. “How do I navigate pitching Albuquerque versus going to Tacoma and being at sea level? That’s something I’ll face in Denver, just more often. In Triple-A, you're in a place for a whole week. In Denver, it's three games, four games, sometimes two games.”
Conversation became constant, not only with Oberg and his coaches, but with catchers Drew Romo and Daniel Cope on pitch strategy and with Dollander and other pitchers who bounced between the Rockies and Triple-A.
Hughes is challenging hitters with five pitches -- a four-seam fastball that cuts, a two-seam sinker, a true slider, a curveball and a changeup. His altitude adjustment is based on how he uses his mix. At times, he forced himself to throw a breaking ball right after missing with a breaking ball, and he was doing the same with his changeup. Each pitch was information on how the pitch reacted at altitude and sea level. The goal was determining the best way to adjust the pitch mix depending on the venue.
“It’s not changing my mechanics, not changing my sights,” he said. “The biggest change for me was the mindset around pitch usage -- understanding that some of my pitches will play better at higher elevation versus at low elevation, and understanding how I can use that information to change the percentages that I'm throwing each pitch.”
Hughes realizes he has more to learn even when he reaches the top level.
“I feel like I'm in a similar position to a lot of the young pitchers and that we're all figuring things out on the fly,” Hughes said.