In beginning, there was Nied

DENVER.

When a franchise has a short history like the Colorado Rockies, it is easy to go back to the beginning.

The road to the Rockies’ first World Series game last night — Game 3 against the Boston Red Sox at Coors Field — began Nov. 17, 1992, when David Nied was the first player picked in the expansion draft.

It was a promising beginning for both the player and baseball in Denver.

“[Rockies general manager] Bob Gebhard called me the day before the draft and said they were going to make me their first pick,” Nied said. “They asked me to keep it quiet and said they would fly me in the next day to introduce me.

“I never imagined what I would see that next day,” he said. “There were 20,000 there for it. I wondered what I was getting myself into.

“I didn’t know anything about Denver baseball and … people were wanting a team there for so long,” Nied said. “It was an unbelievable day. I figured my life had changed a little bit.”

A 14th-round pick by the Atlanta Braves in 1987, Nied blossomed in the Atlanta system, becoming part of a crop of great young pitchers for the Braves franchise. He was behind John Smoltz and Tom Glavine and in the class with Steve Avery and Mark Wohlers.

Nied went 14-9 with Class AAA Richmond in 1992 and was called up by the Braves near the end of the season. He fit right in, making six appearances, including two starts, and went 3-0 with a 1.17 ERA. Nied was even on the Braves’ World Series roster when Kent Mercker was hurt in the celebration at home plate after Sid Bream’s slide produced the winning run in Game 7 of the National League Championship Series against Pittsburgh, but he never made an appearance in the series against Toronto.

Still, Nied figured he would be part of the Braves’ future — until he learned by watching ESPN that was he was not going to be protected by the organization from the expansion draft for the Rockies and the Florida Marlins.

“From what I found out, I was originally going to be protected, but Ted Turner, the owner, was upset that Deion Sanders was not going to be protected, so they protected him and left me off,” Nied said.

Instead, the young pitcher became the first to wear a Rockies uniform.

“I hadn’t done anything on the field, but since I was the first player taken, I had become a fan favorite out of default,” he said. “I was under a microscope.”

His first spring training appearance drew a large crowd to Tucson, where the Rockies trained. Nied pitched the first regular-season game in Rockies history, losing 3-0 to Dwight Gooden and the Mets in 1993.

“He pitched a shutout, but I didn’t do that bad, giving up two runs in five innings,” Nied said.

He also pitched the third home game for Colorado before a sold-out crowd of 80,000 at old Mile High Stadium.

“It was unbelievable to look out and see that sea of people out there when I went to the mound,” Nied said. “It was really neat to be part of.”

Nied went just 5-9 with a 5.19 ERA that first year, struggling with some arm problems. But he had a strong 1994 strike-shortened season with a 9-7 record and a 4.80 ERA on a team that had a 53-64 record. At the time, a 4.80 ERA wasn’t great, but the way the thin air affected pitching in Denver was not taken into account as much as it is today, when the Rockies cool baseballs in a humidor at Coors Field to try to compensate for the thin air.

“It looked like we were putting up some ugly numbers, but at the time nobody realized those numbers weren’t that bad for pitching in Denver,” Nied said. “Baseball wasn’t used to ERAs in the high fours and low fives. Ten years later, I found out that the 4.80 ERA was one of the top five ERAs in Rockies history.”

It has since dropped off the list, mostly because of the humidor.

Still, in 1994 Nied looked worthy of being the No. 1 pick in the expansion draft. But the strike, as it turned out, would ruin his career.

“When we finally came back to play in 1995, it was a short spring because the season was delayed by the strike,” he said. “I tried to get ready too quickly and tore some ligaments in my elbow. I was never the same after that. I couldn’t find my mechanics anymore. I went from a guy who had pretty good control to a guy who couldn’t throw strikes.”

In 1995, the year the Rockies made the postseason as the first NL wild-card team with a 77-67 record, Nied pitched in just two games and gave up 10 runs in 41/3 innings. He only made six appearances the following season, and surrendered eight runs in 51/3 innings.

“I didn’t know my best days were behind me when I got hurt,” he said.

The Rockies released Nied after the season, and he signed with the Cincinnati Reds for 1997. But after learning in spring training that the Reds planned on sending him to Class AA at the start of the season, Nied had enough.

“I had two years of being hurt and pitching terribly,” he said. “I went into the office, shook their hands and said I was going to move on with my life.”

He did, going back to Southlake, Texas, a suburb of Dallas, to work with his father in the family business of selling car cylinders, where he now runs the company.

“I was lucky to have something to fall back on,” said Nied, who at 38 is a little more than two years younger than Red Sox starter Curt Schilling, who turns 41 next month. “I had a chance to come back here and raise my family.”

Nied was honored a few weeks ago with induction into the Duncanville High School Hall of Fame, along with former NFL player Ray Crockett, another alumnus.

“It was nice honor,” he said.

But he is forever etched into the record books of the Rockies as the first player in the history of the franchise; he threw the first pitch, the first strike, the first complete game and the first shutout. Nied was planning on being at last night’s game as a guest of Rockies owner Charlie Monfort. It will be his first time back in Denver since he played here. He treasures his place in Rockies history and the people who welcomed him here that exciting day in 1992.

“That whole year was remarkable,” Nied said. “Playing in front of 4 million people, they treated us so good because they were just so happy to have baseball out there. I’m sure times have changed, and they may be a little more demanding, but back then, people put you on a pedestal because you were a Colorado Rockie.”