Well, here we are hanging on to playoff life with 11 games to go. On homestand now with 3 vs. decent Twins team, day off then 3 vs. Pirates.

It's now or never

(09-18-2023, 12:58 PM)bengalfan74 Wrote: Well, here we are hanging on to playoff life with 11 games to go. On homestand now with 3 vs. decent Twins team, day off then 3 vs. Pirates.

It's now or never

The Dbacks sweeping the Cubs has brought the 2nd WC spot back into contention. A week ago, it felt like the Giants, Dbacks, Marlins and Reds were fighting for that final playoff spot.

Now, it looks like the the Giants, Dbacks, Marlins, Reds and Cubs will be fighting over the final 2 playoff spots.

5 teams after 2 spots gives the Reds a 40% chance (all things even) whereas 4 team fighting over 1 playoff spot gave the Reds a 25% change (all things even).

So I would say we're in a better position to make the playoffs now than we were a week ago.

The Giants nearly got swept by the Rockies, dropping them to 1.5 games back from us with just 12 games left. This is good because they are one of the two teams that hold a tiebreaker over us. The other team is the Marlins who, unfortunately for everyone, swept the Braves this weekend (who would have thought that possible!), and they now have an incredibly easy schedule to finish the season, with their hardest opponent being 3 games against the Brewers. I'm going to be rooting for the Brewers hard there, as icky as that will feel.

The Cubs and Dbacks, we hold tiebreakers over, so we are in a decent position to beat them for that final playoff spot. Luckily for us, they both have fairly tough schedules to finish the season. 

The Dbacks have 2 games against the Giants (so one of those two teams is guaranteed to lose for the next 2 games), and then 3 against the Astros to finish the season. They have the Yankees and White Sox in between, which are technically easy games, but the Yankees are still over .500 and have won 6 of their last 8, so maybe they can handle the Dbacks for a few games.

The Cubs have  6 typically considered "easy games" against the Pirates and the white hot Rockies (who took 2 of 3 from the Cubs last week and 3 of 4 from the Giants this past weekend) and then 6 brutally hard games against the Braves and Brewers.

We, on the other hand, have 3 against Minnesota which may be somewhat difficult, and then 8 against theoretically "easy" teams, but 3 are against the Cardinals and we all know how the Reds shit the bed against the Cardinals more often than not.

When the dust settles, my guess is that it'll be the Dbacks and Marlins in those final 2 wildcard spots, but if we can get hot and take 2 from the Twins and 2 fom the Cardinals, we may be able to edge the Dbacks and Cubs.

I think the Marlins are in pretty secure shape at this point though.

https://www.mlbtraderumors.com/2023/09/reds-graham-ashcraft-scheduled-for-season-ending-toe-surgery.html

Ashcraft is done for the year

Nice outing for the rookie Phillips. Twins are going to hit some HR’s, but the kid was really good other than that. Gave them 7 innings.

Marlins lose to the Mets so it's a 3 way tie for the last wildcard spot. Cubs hold it by percentage points followed by Reds/Marlins.

Good start by Phillips.

Marte quietly playing himself into making sure DLC is the guy who is sent down to AAA if there is a roster crunch for a spot next season.


(Votto with back-to-back multihit games.)

(09-19-2023, 12:35 AM)TheLeonardLeap Wrote: Good start by Phillips.

Marte quietly playing himself into making sure DLC is the guy who is sent down to AAA if there is a roster crunch for a spot next season.


(Votto with back-to-back multihit games.)

Yes sir Marte has been kinda quietly turning it on in September. Now batting .304 overall, .409 in Sept. and he's batting .280 vs. lefties and .315 vs. right. It's still way to early to tell for sure but there's a lot to feel good about.

CES has brought it up a bit as well, now at .273

DLC on the other hand is still struggling, .233 I still question whether he should just give up batting right handed? .184

(09-19-2023, 09:05 AM)bengalfan74 Wrote: DLC on the other hand is still struggling, .233 I still question whether he should just give up batting right handed? .184

The answer for that for almost everyone is yes. Rarely are switch hitters actually valuable from both sides.

Then again I guess success is less important than simply standing on that side when it comes to his lefty/righty obsessed manager.

Whether or not Elly should give up switch hitting should depend on how the coaches view his ability to hit from the right side. If they are concerned about it, they should start testing how he does against LHP as a lefty.

But 103 ABs isn't enough to justify cutting out an aspect of his game that he has been fairly successful at for his entire minor league career.

(09-19-2023, 10:41 AM)Crazyjdawg Wrote: Whether or not Elly should give up switch hitting should depend on how the coaches view his ability to hit from the right side. If they are concerned about it, they should start testing how he does against LHP as a lefty.

But 103 ABs isn't enough to justify cutting out an aspect of his game that he has been fairly successful at for his entire minor league career.

I get that

But the thing I can't help but question is? Wouldn't consistency - only batting LH, help him gain confidence and learn how to handle lefty pitchers better if he quit convoluting the picture? I feel one of his bigger issues at the plate is just simply trying too hard.

And here I go again. I also believe playing one position and batting in one spot would help. He's SS batting 7th today, 3B batting 4th tomorrow, DH batting 9th next day.

I can't and never will be onboard with Bell's musical lineup crud. Guys can't get comfortable.

(09-19-2023, 12:35 PM)bengalfan74 Wrote: I get that

But the thing I can't help but question is? Wouldn't consistency - only batting LH, help him gain confidence and learn how to handle lefty pitchers better if he quit convoluting the picture? I feel one of his bigger issues at the plate is just simply trying too hard.

And here I go again. I also believe playing one position and batting in one spot would help. He's SS batting 7th today, 3B batting 4th tomorrow, DH batting 9th next day.

I can't and never will be onboard with Bell's musical lineup crud. Guys can't get comfortable.

Yea, Bell's managing style is very unusual to me. I'm used to a more traditional approach where most guys have 1 position except in emergencies (barring swiss army knife players like Kyle Farmer), and they bat in, generally, the same spot each night.

But hey, we're 10 games out from the end of the season and in contention for a playoff spot at least 1 to 2 years before anyone could have imagined us being here, so maybe we're the weird ones haha.

Welp this game is over.

(09-19-2023, 09:51 PM)cinci4life Wrote: Welp this game is over.

Miami walked off in the 9th, too.

Why in the hell is Bell continuing this horrendous experiment of putting in a reliever as a starter, pitching an inning or two, then eventually going to Lively after 3-4 innings have passed?

I mean, I know the reason is probably because he's grooming him to come in as a long reliever, but they should probably put in an actual SP who can go more than 2 innings rather than use this parade of relievers before bringing in Lively, right?

Couldn't they give some starting opportunities to Kennedy, Richardson, or Stoudt instead of using all these relievers every 5th game?

It's embarrassing.

(09-20-2023, 12:27 PM)ochocincos Wrote: Why in the hell is Bell continuing this horrendous experiment of putting in a reliever as a starter, pitching an inning or two, then eventually going to Lively after 3-4 innings have passed?

I mean, I know the reason is probably because he's grooming him to come in as a long reliever, but they should probably put in an actual SP who can go more than 2 innings rather than use this parade of relievers before bringing in Lively, right?

Couldn't they give some starting opportunities to Kennedy, Richardson, or Stoudt instead of using all these relievers every 5th game?

It's embarrassing.

Because Bell loves making pitching changes. It makes him feel like a real manager. Same reason he loves pinch hitters and pinch runners and fielding position changes. "Look Dad! I'm managing!"

I don't want to jinx us but...holy shit, Hunter Greene looks outstanding.

I'm trying to keep things in perspective, because the Twins lead the major leagues in strikeouts, but 9 Ks through 5 scoreless innings is exactly what everyone imagined Greene would become when he was drafted.

(09-20-2023, 02:53 PM)Crazyjdawg Wrote: I don't want to jinx us but...holy shit, Hunter Greene looks outstanding.

I'm trying to keep things in perspective, because the Twins lead the major leagues in strikeouts, but 9 Ks through 5 scoreless innings is exactly what everyone imagined Greene would become when he was drafted.

In fact, over his last 4 starts (following 2 rough starts coming off of the IL), he has a line of:

22.0 IP, 10 H, 5 R, 3 ER, 7 BB, 30 K which is a WHIP of 0.77 and an ERA of 1.22

His ERA would be 0.0 if not for that single bad pitch that resulted in a 3 run HR against the Mets. 

He's pitching like he wants to play in October. 

I hope he gets what he wants :)

Well crap.

Regardless of what happens with the bullpen, though, that was a great start by Greene. It's starts like that that'll keep the hope alive about his potential.

That might be game over, folks. We're going to have to basically sweep the remainder of the season to have a decent shot at the playoffs.

That or an utter collapse by the Dbacks and Marlins.

(09-20-2023, 04:06 PM)TheLeonardLeap Wrote: Well crap.

Regardless of what happens with the bullpen, though, that was a great start by Greene. It's starts like that that'll keep the hope alive about his potential.

Yes great outing! I've been trying to hold out hope that Greene can at least turn into a #2, hopefully #1 and it's been hard to keep that hope at times. 

Lets hope by next season he's worked through all his issues he's had in the past.