Seriously, I give up

[Redsfan1507]

I thought the Cardinals had a lock. I still don't believe in the Brewers pitching and bad defense going anywhere. I knew the Reds would struggle on offense, but I didnt think it would be Votto and Bruce leading the slump. As bad as the Reds are, they're only a handful of games out. Obviously, everyone else in the NLC has struggled too.

 

[Redsfan1507]

The Redsox are in the gutter, hopefully the Reds can win a couple there.

 

[JohnU]

I still think St. Louis will win the division. I doubt Milwaukee sniffs the first wild card, could maybe make a play-in game.

Coming into the season, I was on the positives train. Saw Hamilton as less a risk than a challenge. Price, I figured, had established a clubhouse of accountability.

I am not sure if Price did the right or the wrong thing -- he's basically trying to make chicken salad out of chicken shit right now. There's less community to his lineups than a bad billiards rack.

You cannot win with Brayan Pena, Skip Schumaker, Kris Negron and Ramon Santiago in the lineup. It can't be done. It's 110-loss team.

Looking back, had Latos been ready and Chapman healed, Cingrani would have replaced Arroyo in the rotation, Simon would have been in the bullpen and Ondrusek or Hoover sent to DFA. Moving forward and knowing what we know about Cingrani, Simon would still be in the bullpen.

A whole series of dominoes comes into play here but if this team had a chance, it was because of pitching -- and replacing Latos with Simon was genuinely brilliant. Simon is just out of gas and Price can't fix that.

There is no lefty in this rotation and every team in the league has learned to adjust to that. Cingrani's failure is the 2nd biggest disappointment this season.

The other injuries, as a group, are probably a bigger reason this team failed. But part of that has been overrated. All teams have similar injuries.

 

[Redsfan1507]

I hear you. I wouldn't have been surprised if Bruce hit .230, but I would have bet on him hitting around 30 HR. Votto, the other way- I would have bet on .290 or above but doubted his HR production- basically because of the way they pitch around him. What I didn't see was whatever is keeping him from showing his face at a Reds game.

I always doubted Cingrani- his only pitch was a fastball, specifically one too high for an average hitter to swing at, and one more often called a ball if taken. I see him as a reliever due to that limitation, and see Chapman as clearly with potential to be the most dominating starting pitcher in a generation, pidgeon holed into closing for lots of bad reasons, especially since the guy paid to close so Chapman could start, Broxton, is healthy and un hittable.

I expected Price and his coaches to be smarter, and/or more effective- not at changing plate philosophy overnight, but improving baserunning and making more productive outs. I've seen mixed results with all that...happy they steal more, embarrassed they make so many 1st and last outs past 2b. I like the idea of accountability, but don't see much from the guys most accountable for the disappointing season ( in no particular order)-the Reds med staff, the GM, the 3b and hitting coaches, Joey Votto, Jay Bruce, and brass staff that justifies keeping Hoover all year, or why Hannahan , Heisey and Ludwick are worth the $15M or so they're paying them, much less the roster space they occupy. I'm hoping they didnt spend all their cash on Bailey just a year or two before Cueto and Chapman can escape the assylum.

You can't see everything coming around the corner...but Dusty didnt take ALL the Reds stupidity and stubborness and lack of urgency with him though. Hamilton wouldn't have played for Dusty, but Cozart probably wouldn't have lasted this long either. Sometimes change is required, but it's rarely proactive. There were problems to begin with, still are- maybe just different ones. I can make no sense of a team that puts so much pressure on a rookie and so little on a $200M former MVP. A team that will give unending starting position chances to often injured role players, but won't give the best lefty pitcher in a few decades a single SP opportunity.

I don't like un-solved mysteries.

 

[JohnU]

If it wasn't clear after the first 6 games past the All-Star break, it is now.
Price has a broken team and he has no way to fix it. A half-dozen hits against the Rockies shows that at least some of the players on this team have either given up or have lost any sense of how to win.
Simon is sadly stuck in this rotation until he collapses. Now he will be joined by somebody off the waiver wire, or David Holmberg, whichever is quicker to the stadium.
Cueto, Latos and Leake have to win out for the team to finish above .500.

Predictions:
Cueto clearly will not win the CY award.
Hamilton is a threat to not win the ROY award.
Bailey will not pitch again this year.
Neither will Cingrani.

 

[JohnU]

Looks like a best-case scenario of 78 wins, probably more like 75.

 

[tlakes20]

Welp guys it's been a rough 2nd half of the season. I said before the season that I thought the Reds would win 87 games and right now it's not looking like that prediction is going to come true. Injuries killed this team starting off with Latos being out the first few months, Bruce going down, Phillips going down, Votto going down (still a mystery to be honest what's the deal with this), and now Homer going down. And again with what we've seen the last 5 years under Dusty the offense still sucks. Pitching overall has been pretty steady this year, but the roller coaster offense is not going to get it done. It feels like a broken record talking about how the offense is just horrid every year. Hamilton has improved, Frazier has gotten better, Mesoraco has stepped up huge. That's a good sign that the young guys are improving, but damn Votto needs to get whatever is up his ass out of it or else the Reds are going to have another Griffey on their team except a hell of a lot worse.

 

[eburg5000]

This team is a mystery to me. When I think they are done, then they put some wins together. Then just when I start thinking they might do something. They start losing again. I don't know maybe that's just sports. You can never tell what will happened

 

[JohnU]

All teams can win 3 or 4 in a row. The trick is to not win 2, lose 3, win 1, lose 2 ... get swept by teams that are worse ... and try to at least play .600 at home. With a rotation that now includes only 3 real starting pitchers, this is not going to end well.
The offense is clearly a mishmash. This operation, if in place all season, would lose about 110 games even with Cueto and Latos. Frazier and Mesoraco are nice supplemental players .... they should not be the key to the offense.
Keep Hamilton off base and the Reds don't score.
I think now ... 85 losses is very likely.
It's no worse than losing 81, really.

I think the key to this team, early on, was more in whether Cingrani could carry a load. Every rotation needs a lefty and Cingrani just didn't get it done.
Losing Votto was a dealbreaker. He's out for the year. So is Bailey.

 

[redsfan03]

The way I look at it, every loss means a higher draft pick. That doesn't mean I'm rooting for losses, but it's nice to know that a wasteland of a season could turn into something fruitful down the road. Unfortunately, this rationale has pretty much taken away all emotional investment I had in this team. I really don't care one way or the other. I guess that's the worst position to be in as a fan and it could make me a fair weather fan. But it's hard to get emotionally invested when the "team leaders" disappear with mysterious injuries or, in Bruce's case, turn into zombies that can't hit. It's equally hard to get emotionally invested when you know the team won't catch a whiff of the playoffs, but I suppose the true fans stick with it. I guess I would try harder, but I don't have much free time or money.

On the flip side, it is quite enjoyable to watch young guys like Frazier, Mesoraco, and Hamilton play. Their enthusiasm is a breath of fresh air among an otherwise rather listless bunch.

 

[JohnU]

I don't think that we are fair-weather fans. We're still commenting on the team, paying attention to them and observing, having opinions. We didn't just suddenly become fans.

I do know there are people who become fans of teams after moving to new places. I could never do that. I rooted for the White Sox in 2005 mainly because there was no way I was going to root for Los fucking Angeles. But no way do I ever become a Sox fan.

I don't know if this team is all that bad. I do think they've lost focus and I am sure they agree. Steve Smith lost focus. I see a lot of third base coaches who try to "make something happen" when the fact is, playing sensible baseball will eventually achieve the same objective and won't make you look like a dipshit in the process.

Walt needs to find at least one pitcher this winter, and I think he will do that. Could be, finally, Price moves Chapman into the rotation where he belongs. Gezuz, there are 50 closers out there for every starting pitcher with that sort of talent.

I will be interested to see if the Reds decide to invest some energy on Kris Negron, or whether the guy is a minor-leaguer with some good residual luck. I tend to think the latter.

 

[eburg5000]

sure would be nice if Negron could play SS. Not that Cozart is a bad SS. He just can't hit. now that would be alright if everyone else was hitting.

 

[JohnU]

Cozart is a better hitter than he shows. When he's doing it right, he can drive 30 doubles and hit .280. I've seen that. I can see when he's doing it right. His problem is, he doesn't know how to do it right often enough to be a better hitter than he is -- which means he isn't a good hitter but somebody who gets it right off and on.
With him, you hope he's getting it right once or twice a month. Guys like him are rally makers or rally killers.
You are right, eburg ... when the rest of the team struggles, average hitters like Cozart stand out like a fingerprint on a mirror.

 

[eburg5000]

If Negron is the hitter he looks like he can be. Maybe left field is the place for him. he doesn't hit for much power, but he does hit.

 

[Hit-n-Run]

With Ondrusek scheduled to be activated today and BP soon to return the Reds have a few roster moves pending. It's been complicated by the postponed game leaving the Reds without a Thursday SP on normal rest. Comments from Price make it appear Axelrod won't make a start against Atlanta, instead they may call up another replacement.

With multiple roster moves, Negron may be caught in the numbers game and be DFA this week.

I'd cut Hannahan if it were up to me. They owe him $4M to keep him next year and the $2M buyout money is loss money at this point. He has no foreseeable future with the club.

 

[Hit-n-Run]

Jocketty has several options to make room for roster changes. The moves he makes will be a little insight into his opinion of Negron's future with the club. The kid is having his best year at AAA and it has carried over to the opportunity he's currently receiving. I'd like to see him back next spring vying for a utility role.

 

[eburg5000]

With the way this team is hitting (before the double hitter) I don't see how they can afford
D to DNF Negron, but this is a business and the season is virtually over. Plus you can them up anyway in a few weeks

 

[JohnU]

Negron is still pretty cheap bench. His defense is better than Santiago's and he shows he can hit for a little power. He's about 28 now, so generally in his prime for a position player. The Reds are coming up on September so major roster moves aren't necessary. Stashing Negron at Lousyville doesn't make any sense for 10 days. As it looks, the Thursday rotation question seems irrelevant to me, but Price can't play it that way. A one-day callup doesn't work. The problem is Simon. He can't get through 4 innings now, so that challenges the bullpen even more.

This team is toast but you have to treat players the same no matter what their record.

Curt Partch may end up getting a start. It won't matter.

 

[eburg5000]

I'm starting to think the Cubs might catch the Reds. If they keep playing the way they are, and the Cubs put together a little hot streak.
I don't really blame the Reds It's been a tough year. The only breaks they are getting is to the players. Maybe next year those breaks, will fall the Reds way, instead of against them.

 

[JohnU]

The Reds do actually have a very good chance of finishing last.
I have not watched or listened to a game since the "rainout" in Denver.
I also have had very little angst over it.
The season ended at the All-Star break. The series in Yankee Stadium.
So I can no longer evaluate what I have observed, since I only see the box score.