If you feel disenfranchised as a Reds fan at the All-Star break, you’re not imagining it. We were promised more after last year. It was gaslighting. It looks like vintage Reds baseball.
Every spring, hope springs eternal for the Cincinnati Reds, then hope springs a leak.
More like a deluge.
As one watches the 2024 facsimile of a major league team representing Cincinnati, one wonders, “What in the name of Casey Stengel do they do in spring training?”
Play golf? Yes. Go fishing? Yes. Learn fundamentals? No.
They can’t run the bases. They can’t play defense, other than Spiderman center fielder Stuart Fairchild and flashy shortstop Elly De La Cruz. They can’t hit, other than Jonathan India, if you can call .273 hitting.
As Casey Stengel asked while managing the 120-loss 1962 New York Mets, “Can anybody here play this game?”
And as Stengel said midway through that season, “Don’t cut my throat. I may want to do that myself.”
The Reds? They cut their own throats.
There was a time when fan favorites like this one stayed long-term, produced, and called Cincinnati home. Now, such talent can’t wait until their option year…when they can get out of
Cincinnati.
They way they are playing now, it is price-gouging what they force fans to pay. The only reason to pay attention is to watch De La Cruz steal bases with the greatest of ease, when he gets on base.
Fans got tipsy when the Reds went into Yankee Stadium and swept three games from the New York Yankees. But the Yankees were on a horrid streak and the Reds missed pitcher Gerit Cole. And the Yankees were missing Giancarlo Stanton and Reds-assassin Anthony Rizzo.
To display that it was a fluke, the Reds returned home to the comforts of Great American Small Park and were blitezed three straight by the Detroit Tigers, who are in about the same shape as the automobile industry in that city.
As for fundamentals, the Reds have turned running on contact into an art form of running on contact into outs.
Four times in a two-week period, a runner on third with less than two outs was thrown out at home, running on contact. One so-called contact was a six-foot dribbler in front of home plate. The catcher picked up the ball, turn around, took two steps homeward and tagged out Jake Fraley.
It is more like the Jackson Browne song, “Running On Empty.”
There was a time when it was really hard to hit less than Pirate legend Mario Mendoza (.215 lifetime). Will Benson (.189) has figured out how.
Hitting? Let’s leap back to that three-game sweep in New York. They won one game, 3-2, with three hits. In the three games they had 17 hits and won only because seven of those hits were home runs.
It wouldn’t be shocking if pitcher Hunter Green walked into general manager Nick Krall’s office and said, “Trade me. Trade me now. I can’t care where, just trade me.”
Greene went three straight starts when the team scored zero runs while he was on the mound…20 straight innings without his teammates sniffing home plate.
Then in the fourth game they finally scored for him, a whole two runs against the Tigers. And Greene guarded those two runs like Machine Gun Kelly with two machine guns.
He pitched seven scoreless three-hit innings and was breezing like a cool summer zephyr in Maine. Still strong, still mowing ‘em down. He went 1-2-3 in the seventh.
But manager David Bell, perusing his ever-present iPad, noticed that Greene had thrown 104 pitches.
Never mind that Greene is young and strong and that the Tigers couldn’t hit him with a cut-down canoe paddle. Analytics say 100 pitches is pitching’s Great Wall of China.
Out Greene goes. Out goes the win. The Reds’ bullpen gave up five runs in the eighth and Greene was left holding the rosin bag.
Defense? Third baseman Noelvi Marte, back from his 80-game suspension for using PEDs, is a three-star defender. He can’t catch pop-ups, he can’t field ground balls and he can’t throw to first base. In his first 10 games back he made five errors, most of them on throws to first base.
The Reds are considering Crash Helmet Night for fans sitting behind first base. Fortunately, there is a protective screen there.
But at least he can hit, right? Wrong. Even Mario Mendoza would blush at what Marte has done since his return…40 at bats .150 average, 14 strikeouts, one double, one home run.
And Will Benson? In 244 plate appearances, he struck out 111 times, the most in MLB. He batting average was .189. With runners on base, if you are keeping score at home, mark a ‘K’ in your scorebook before the first pitch.
Yes, injuries have helped put this team in deep freeze. They’ve lost Matt McLain, Christian Encarnacion-Strand, TJ Friedl and pitcher Brandon Williamson.
Hall of fame writer Hal McCoy covers the UD Flyers/OSU baseball for Press Pros Magazine.com
Injuries, though, are rampant among most teams and most teams adjust, teams like Philadelphia and Atlanta.
And payroll isn’t a legitimate excuse. All one has to do is look north to Cleveland. The Guardians own one of baseball’s lowest payrolls and one of baseball’s best records.
It is about drafting and development for payroll-strapped franchises. The Guardians know how it’s done.
The Reds? They’ve about tapped out in calling up replacement troops and those replacements haven’t produced. Most of their best prospects are in the lower echelons of the minors.
Who knows if they are prospects or suspects?
So now, as the All-Star break approaches, the Reds hope they can catch the Pittsburgh Pirates and hold off the Chicago Cubs.
As general manager Nick Krall said in a recent interview, “We need to run the bases better, play better defense and hit better.”
Well, duh.
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