I already liked CES as he has the best walk up song (Johnny Cash), but that was an awesome ending tonight for my first game of the season.

I'll take it. Another heroic moment for a rookie.

This team is going to be so good as these rookies mature.

2nd and 3rd with one out and can't score. Ugh.

Reds can't seem to pull out victories anymore. I look forward to the future even if we don't make the playoffs this year. Fun to watch the rookies play ball. Just think next year when Votto and Moose contracts are gone. We should be contenders.

(08-20-2023, 03:09 AM)guyofthetiger Wrote: Reds can't seem to pull out victories anymore. I look forward to the future even if we don't make the playoffs this year. Fun to watch the rookies play ball. Just think next year when Votto and Moose contracts are gone. We should be contenders.

“Oh you sweet, sweet summer child…” - Phil C (as ownership pockets the profits, neglecting the bullpen or the sorely needed power bat for 2024)

I think Reds Ownership is pretty darn good. I agree with person who said Reds will be better with Moose and Votto contracts over in a few months. The person that then pretty much said Reds Owners are cheap and will only pocket the money. Do you even know anything about money or the slanted economics of MLB. The NY Yankees have the most money. Boston and LA have a ton of money also. Way down the list on money is smaller town Cincinnati. So no fans in stands Covid 2020 hurt Cincinnati far more than deep pockets Yankees. So Reds owners had to cut high priced players, but they could not drop No Trade Contract Votto. So Reds then also had worst attendance since 1982 in 2021 and 2022. 3 Years of Reds Owners losing huge MONEY. More of that and Reds would have to move to another city. However all along Reds were loading up on Minor League Players more than Yankees. In Covid, teams like Yankees were dumping Minor League Players due to no Minor Leagues, and Reds and Rays swooped in and grabbed Minor League Players in 2020. All the Minor League additions are starting to pay off for teams like Reds, Rays, Orioles.

Reds owners aren't cheap or they would not have built Reds Hall of Fame, which is better than anything other teams have. Reds Owners are great to the Fans. This is a First Class Front Office. Reds have had good attendance in 2023 for first time since 2019, They actually do have to bank some of the money after 3 years of losing huge money, but we can NOT blame Reds owners for Covid setback to small market Cincinnati. Reds are coming Back Baby, with good young players. They will have Pitching and they will have Bats and they will have great Fielding, plus that dugout has Heart, miles and miles of Heart. I love the attitude of the 2023 Reds in the dugout as a TEAM, not just poor attitude selfish players, but a TEAM working together and having some Fun also in their Viking helmet.

OK, TODAY, HUNTER GREENE IS BACK...He Pitches for Reds TODAY....A big part of the good young pitching staff that could end up the Best Young Pitching Staff in MLB and THAT wins a lot of games. Reds do have Young, Exciting Pitchers and so The Future looks Bright. The Reds could end up as dominate in pitching depth as Nationals were for a while.

Also, Reds are very much in 2023 Play-Off Hunt. In AL there are 4 teams with good records, Orioles, Rays, Astros, Rangers. In NL there are only 2 teams with good records, Braves and Dodgers, so the NL Play-Off Picture is wide open going into September with Reds having as much chance for Play-Offs as anybody.

GO REDS....and Welcome Back Hunter Greene.

So is there anyone in the Bluejays lineup that hasn't hit a dinger off Weaver err I mean Greene?

Well, the Hunter Greene return was disappointing to say the least. I'm not sure I've ever seen a staff Ace hit so hard and so often? 5HR's 4 2B's 1 triple in three innings!

So where do we go from here? I'm not saying Greene is washed up, he's just 24 years old. But my hopes of somehow making the postseason this year have totally evaporated. It's gonna take some innings for him to get back on track.

(08-21-2023, 09:26 AM)bengalfan74 Wrote: Well, the Hunter Greene return was disappointing to say the least. I'm not sure I've ever seen a staff Ace hit so hard and so often? 5HR's 4 2B's 1 triple in three innings!

So where do we go from here? I'm not saying Greene is washed up, he's just 24 years old. But my hopes of somehow making the postseason this year have totally evaporated. It's gonna take some innings for him to get back on track.

Hunter Greene may end up being this generation's Homer Bailey.

Bailey had a career ERA of 4.56, a career WAR of 6.2, but he also threw 2 no hitters as well as multiple 10+ K games.

I think Greene's potential is much higher than Bailey's, as he has that 100+ mph fastball potential.

The problem is, despite how fast he can throw it, major league hitters don't seem to have any problem catching up to it.

I've long felt like a triple digit fastball is pretty much worthless unless one of these three are true:
1. It has incredible movement that is not predictable (basically, you have to be Mariano Rivera, granted his main pitch was technically a cutter).
2. The pitcher has a high quality change up that is ~10 mph slower and comes out of the same arm angle and arm action.
3. The pitcher has a wipeout breaking ball (usually slider, but sometimes a curve) that comes out of a similar arm angle.


Remember, Luis Castillo could hit 98 with relative ease, but what made him such a deadly pitcher was that his change up looks exactly like his fastball until it was too late.

As far as I can tell, Hunter does not have any of these three at the moment, so he will get high strikeout numbers when players struggle to catch up to his heater, but once the batters sync up to it, they can ignore the obvious breaking balls and just time up the fastball and let it ride.

It didn't help that the weather yesterday was basically prime home run weather. I've never seen a ball go out of the stadium at less than 90 mph before, but one left at just 87 mph yesterday (which I believe was a new record, either for the season or ever, I don't recall).

It's just a shame that the Reds hitters weren't able to capitalize on that...

Tonight's game has been postponed

(08-21-2023, 02:56 PM)Crazyjdawg Wrote: Hunter Greene may end up being this generation's Homer Bailey.

Bailey had a career ERA of 4.56, a career WAR of 6.2, but he also threw 2 no hitters as well as multiple 10+ K games.

I think Greene's potential is much higher than Bailey's, as he has that 100+ mph fastball potential.

The problem is, despite how fast he can throw it, major league hitters don't seem to have any problem catching up to it.

I've long felt like a triple digit fastball is pretty much worthless unless one of these three are true:
1. It has incredible movement that is not predictable.
2. The pitcher has a high quality change up that is ~10 mph slower and comes out of the same arm angle and arm action.
3. The pitcher has a wipeout breaking ball (usually slider, but sometimes a curve) that comes out of a similar arm angle.


Remember, Luis Castillo could hit 98 with relative ease, but what made him such a deadly pitcher was that his change up looks exactly like his fastball until it was too late.

As far as I can tell, Hunter does not have any of these three at the moment, so he will get high strikeout numbers when players struggle to catch up to his heater, but once the batters sync up to it, they can ignore the obvious breaking balls and just time up the fastball and let it ride.

It didn't help that the weather yesterday was basically prime home run weather. I've never seen a ball go out of the stadium at less than 90 mph before, but one left at just 87 mph yesterday (which I believe was a new record, either for the season or ever, I don't recall).

It's just a shame that the Reds hitters weren't able to capitalize on that...

Agree

In order to become at true staff Ace, dominant #1 starter. He has to get better with his off speed stuff. In today's game having a 100mph fastball and nothing else just isn't going to cut it. Not as a starter anyways.

They've got so many different names for pitches today.  But his slider doesn't slide enough, his curve doesn't curve enough. And if he has a changeup it's not effective.

I hope he can get something figured out. Because just overpowering hitters isn't going to work for him.

Toronto Blue Jays beat up Reds Pitching. Now let me tell everybody. Blue Jays beat up Yankees, Red Sox, Orioles and Rays pitching. My brother is a Tampa Fan, and he hates when they play Toronto. Toronto hitters can flat out beat you to death.

The main thing is Hunter Greene got his innings in at Louisville and on Sunday for Reds, like Spring Training and Start of Season after his injury. You can't expect someone back from injury to be 100 % right away. Toronto smoked Williamson also, who has been pitching great. Toronto does that, they beat up on some of the best pitchers in The American League.

Now The Angles hitters are no piece of cake either. Some great hitters on Angels. So playing Blue Jays and Angels back to back is a pitching staff nightmare.

Still, The Reds are in the Play-Off hunt. There are only 2 NL teams with good records, Braves and Dodgers. So the Play-Off spots are wide open for whoever gets HOT in late August and September. As the great Orioles manager Earl Weaver always said, he wanted his team to get hot in late August and September and take that into the play-offs. Now The Reds could get hot down the stretch. Reds have as much chance of getting hot as anybody in National League. If Reds get hot to end of season and make play-offs, as Earl Weaver said, they will on pace to win in the play-offs. As good as Braves and Dodgers records are, if they get cold down the stretch, they will be cold going into play-offs. The hottest teams in September will be play-off ready, and Cincinnati Reds could be a hot team, they could get hot.

1970 Reds were a great team, but they got cold in September and Orioles got hot in September. The 1990 Reds however got hot in September and won World Series. It's nice to win in April and May, those wins count, but the teams that get hot in September are hot going into Play-Offs. Reds could get hot.

As for Angels, Marlins World Series winning manager Jack McKeon would just walk Ohtani whenever possible. Take the bat out of his hands. Who cares if his OBP goes up, if he is getting no RBI's. McKeon use to walk Big Mac, Sosa and Bonds, they hit no homers on Reds. We saw Votto in his homer years and Votto in his getting a lot of walks years. Walks don't win ball games, no matter what OBP people think. As Tony Perez said, RBI's win ball games. The RBI Votto was better than the getting walks Votto. So maybe just walk Ohtani and take the bat out of his hands as Jack McKeon would do when managing Reds.

(08-21-2023, 09:26 AM)bengalfan74 Wrote: Well, the Hunter Greene return was disappointing to say the least. I'm not sure I've ever seen a staff Ace hit so hard and so often? 5HR's 4 2B's 1 triple in three innings!

So where do we go from here? I'm not saying Greene is washed up, he's just 24 years old. But my hopes of somehow making the postseason this year have totally evaporated. It's gonna take some innings for him to get back on track.

I'd argue it's a strong overreaction on Greene.
It's his first game back from injury in like 2 months.
Could he have spent more time at LOU rather than come back and blow a start like that? Sure, but the other option to pitch in his place might not have really done much better.
It sucks to see a result like that when the Reds are so close to the division lead this late in the season, but I've almost come to just say, "Whatever happens, happens" given the lack of moves at the trade deadline.
They clearly are interested in setting up for 2024. If the postseason is achieved this year, that's just a bonus.
I'd like to think they'll be willing to spend some this offseason since Votto's contract can come off the books and they likely got some extra money from ticket sales this summer while the team was doing (way) better than expected.

Reds have 37 games left
Currently sitting 4.0 games out of the division
1.0 game back for the last WC spot

Remainder of series:
@ Angels (3 games)
@Diamondbacks (4 games)
@Giants (3 games)
vs Cubs (4 games)
vs Mariners (3 games)
vs Cardinals (3 games)
@ Tigers (3 games)
@ Mets (3 games)
vs Twins (3 games)
vs Pirates (3 games)
@ Guardians (2 games)
@ Cardinals (3 games)

The bad news - The upcoming next stretch of games between the D-backs and Seattle is against teams all with winning records
The good news - Every other team the rest of the way after aside from the Twins have a losing record

So we could see the Reds fall further back by early September, but we could see a true push through September given the weak schedule.

Oh boy:

https://www.msn.com/en-us/sports/mlb/young-cincinnati-reds-starter-suffers-awful-setback-in-injury-recovery-season-now-in-question/ar-AA1fDzrq?ocid=msedgdhp&pc=U531&cvid=d3f51b439d444bc38fc30d2a5a4e22a0&ei=39

Votto looking just brutal the last two weeks.

Not sold on Marte and DLC defensively so far at 3B and SS respectively.

(08-23-2023, 12:07 AM)TheLeonardLeap Wrote: Votto looking just brutal the last two weeks.

Not sold on Marte and DLC defensively so far at 3B and SS respectively.

Yea, Votto seems to be out of it. He is swinging at pitches he would NEVER have swung at in his prime. That isn't a physical loss, that's a mental change.

I hope he gets it together to finish the season, but the idea of having him on the roster next year seems bleak.

DLC is a much better 3B, imo, because his biggest strength is his rocket arm but I think he's decent at SS. 

Marte has only played 2 games so far, so I'll reserve judgement, but he doesn't look like a defensive savant out there, that's for sure.

Big win tonight considering they're facing Ohtani in game 1 of the doubleheader later today.

(08-23-2023, 01:16 AM)cinci4life Wrote: Big win tonight considering they're facing Ohtani in game 1 of the doubleheader later today.

Ohtani vs Abbott . . . might be a 90 minute ball game

(08-23-2023, 12:07 AM)TheLeonardLeap Wrote: Votto looking just brutal the last two weeks.

Not sold on Marte and DLC defensively so far at 3B and SS respectively.

Yep

Votto looked very awkward at the plate last night. Perhaps he needs to take a couple days off?

I really don't want to see him go out like this. Hopefully Fraley and India return soon, and they can start limiting Votto's appearances a bit.