Marty Brennaman slams Adam Dunn....again.

[reds44]

The golden tones of the hall of famer regarding Adam Dunn:

"I'm tired of hearing people say he'll give you forty homers and drive in a hundred runs every year. First of all, he didn't drive in 100 runs last year. The most overrated stat in baseball is the damn home run. Give me a guy that'll run to his position and run off the field. More often than not, he walks to his position and walks off the field. Give me a guy that shows some life out there. His approach to hitting is the same if the count is 0-0 or 3-2. We all know his knowledge of the strike zone because he walks over a hundred times a year."

WHY DOES THAT MATTER? WHAT DOES THAT HAVE TO DO WITH THE TYPE OF PLAYER HE IS OR HOW HE PRODUCES?

"The most overrated player in baseball is the damn scrappy one."

[Dom Heffner]

WHY DOES THAT MATTER? WHAT DOES THAT HAVE TO DO WITH THE TYPE OF PLAYER HE IS OR HOW HE PRODUCES?

I think this comes from the Pete Rose era, I really do. It comes from the false notion that Pete Rose was an average baseball player that hit a bunch of balls that would have been outs had he not run really hard to his position between innings and slid head first into third.

Yep, Rose was just awful. He was only good because he showed life out there.

You'd almost think Rose had 4,256 infield singles to listen to these old-timers.

[George Anderson]

While I share alot of the criticisms the rest of you do about Marty. At least he isnt trying to say players names backwards or announcing that Lou and Ethel Mc Guinness from Peoria, Illinois are at the game today.

[pedro]

While I share alot of the criticisms the rest of you do about Marty. At least he isnt trying to say players names backwards or announcing that Lou and Ethel Mc Guinness from Peoria, Illinois are at the game today.

and his name spelled backwards is visad cire

[roby]

Willie Greene, Chris Sabo, Eric Davis (Time #1) all have felt Marty's tongue lashing, Greene was beaten by Marty daily in the late 90's.

Let's add others like Showalter and LaRussa to the list too, and the league even stepped in to tell him to dial it back a notch concerning Dave Pallone 20 years ago. This is hardly new stuff fro Marty.

Here we are 2 weeks from March and Marty is marketing Reds baseball.

Yippee!!!

Reds Fever.... loath it and deride it.

Dave Pallone deserved every bit of Marty's wrath...and a lot more.

[deltachi8]

I think i once notice Adam amble out to LF...

[Dom Heffner]

While I share alot of the criticisms the rest of you do about Marty. At least he isnt trying to say players names backwards or announcing that Lou and Ethel Mc Guinness from Peoria, Illinois are at the game today.

Marty has his banana phone and other idosyncracies. The fact that harry Carey stunk doesn't make me feel better about Marty.

Sportscasters in general have started to make sports less enjoyable for me.

Someone like Joe Morgan is a prime example.

Caller #1: Joe, what do you think about Jonathon Papelbon?

Morgan: Well, I haven't gotten a chance to see him play, really, so I don't want to offer an opinion on him.

Caller #2; What do you think of Ryan Theriot?

Morgan: I don't get too see him play much, so I don't want to say anything.

Well, gee, Joe, I've never seen these guys play in person, either, but I have this thing called the internet and newspapers and I can tell you about them and I only work for a living.

Morgan, like Marty, thinks we get too caught up in numbers to analyze these players. I'm not sure what else there is to look at, but it must involve watching them every day while holding a stop watch to see how quickly they walk out to their position.

[Yachtzee]

While I share alot of the criticisms the rest of you do about Marty. At least he isnt trying to say players names backwards or announcing that Lou and Ethel Mc Guinness from Peoria, Illinois are at the game today.

I actually found the whole "name backwards" thing kind of endearing. Of course, I'm a big dork who did stuff like that with my friends. By the way, my name backwards is "Eezthcay."

[Dom Heffner]

I never heard Carey do that until one day he said out of freaking nowhere, "You know, Sosa spelled backwards is "A-sose."

I'll agree with Yachtzee and say it was endearing. Or, at least it wasn't bitter and uniformed.

[George Anderson]

I actually found the whole "name backwards" thing kind of endearing. Of course, I'm a big dork who did stuff like that with my friends. By the way, my name backwards is "Eezthcay."

Its fun to listen to know and again, but day in and day out I thought it got old.

[paintmered]

"I'm tired of hearing people say he'll give you forty homers and drive in a hundred runs every year. First of all, he didn't drive in 100 runs last year. The most overrated stat in baseball is the damn home run. Give me a guy that'll run to his position and run off the field. More often than not, he walks to his position and walks off the field. Give me a guy that shows some life out there. His approach to hitting is the same if the count is 0-0 or 3-2. We all know his knowledge of the strike zone because he walks over a hundred times a year."

Marketing 101.

[Caveat Emperor]

I think this comes from the Pete Rose era, I really do. It comes from the false notion that Pete Rose was an average baseball player that hit a bunch of balls that would have been outs had he not run really hard to his position between innings and slid head first into third.

There's also a bit of baseball urban legend that goes towards the idea of "if a hitter is in a slump, he needs to hustle extra hard to try and turn a groundout into a single, which will break the slump."

I see a lot of that with fans reactions towards Adam Dunn. He's perceived as slumping when he strikes out a lot, so every fan immediately reverts back to a 7 year old being screamed at by their hypercompetitive little league coach and being told to "hustle up" down the line.

[redsfanfalcon]

I was just thinking that myself as I pondered the awfulness of Ryan Howard.

Maybe if Dunn struck out 40 times less and then added 20 more ground outs and 20 more fly outs, we'd all feel better.

You have to spread those outs around. Even things out. That is what makes a great hitter.

Ryan Howard also hit .313. Those ground outs might get a runner over, and those flyouts might get a guy in from third.

[macro]

Man, this thread is a whole lot like this one.

[jojo]

I was just thinking that myself as I pondered the awfulness of Ryan Howard.

It's about time people start calling out Howard.... why with the 181 ks from last year he's basically just taking that league minimum ($355K last season)...