The 2004 Colorado Rockies are not a team that anyone wanted to write home about. They finished the season in fourth place in the NL West with a record of 68-94, as only the Arizona Diamondbacks (three years removed from defeating the three-peat champion New York Yankees in the 2001 World Series) with a record of 51-111.
The Rockies offense was pretty good (100 OPS+ excluding pitchers hitting) but their main problem was their atrocious pitching staff. Their 5.54 ERA was dead last in both the National League and all of baseball by more than a third of a run (the Reds were next worst in baseball with a 5.