03-05-2019, 01:55 AM
(03-04-2019, 12:26 PM)bengalfan74 Wrote: I have no problems with JV except this:I’ve criticized him in the past for being passive at the wrong times too. I do think that he may feel revived this year with all of the new teammates. A better pitching staff sure won’t hurt either.
Bottom of the 8th runners on 1st and 2nd one out down by two runs. JV comes up and takes a 5 pitch walk and only has the bat off his shoulder once ! 3 of the 4 balls he took were extremely close to the strike zone and could have been called strikes by many umpires. Votto walks and the next batter hits into a 6-4-3 DP, we lose.
He's not aggressive enough in situations where it's absolutely called for ! He's among the league leaders in walks every season and a lot of that isn't intentional walks or pitching around him, some is for sure to be fair.
He's failed to be clutch in many games and many seasons. We don't need more base runners in situations like the one above, we need somebody to knock the cover off the ball and JV can do that if he wasn't so damn into waiting on the perfect pitch !
I'm with Fred on JV being a big determining factor on this season. Do we get 2016 JV or 2018 JV ?
Swing the damn bat Joey !
