Key to the Season? The Boss

[Scrap Irony]

The team OPS would make Mario Mendoza worry. The starting eight have almost as many RBI collectively as does one Joey Votto. Brandon Phillips is still chasing outside sliders, EdE hasn't hit a ball hard in a week, Razor Ramon is dull, and AGon's stick AWent.

You know how bad the Red offense is? Willy Taveras, whipping boy extraordinaire of the off-season, is currently Cincinnati's second-best offensive player. And has been for two weeks now.

But the Boss... Man, the Boss. That swing. That power.

If Bruce is able to find his stroke, he makes the team so much better.

Bruce on a streak means fastballs to both EdE and Phillips, both notorious fastball hitters. It means more times through the lineup, more two and three-run leads for starters, less taxation on the pen.

And more wins.

[Homer Bailey]

The team OPS would make Mario Mendoza worry. The starting eight have almost as many RBI collectively as does one Joey Votto. Brandon Phillips is still chasing outside sliders, EdE hasn't hit a ball hard in a week, Razor Ramon is dull, and AGon's stick AWent.

You know how bad the Red offense is? Willy Taveras, whipping boy extraordinaire of the off-season, is currently Cincinnati's second-best offensive player. And has been for two weeks now.

But the Boss... Man, the Boss. That swing. That power.

If Bruce is able to find his stroke, he makes the team so much better.

Bruce on a streak means fastballs to both EdE and Phillips, both notorious fastball hitters. It means more times through the lineup, more two and three-run leads for starters, less taxation on the pen.

And more wins.

Jay is my favorite player, and I agree, this team goes as Jay goes. I've loved his at bats in Chicago, but he still has shown me very little discipline at the plate this year. If he can show some maturity, and stop chasing terrible pitches, this lineup will be MUCH more fearful, as Scrap has noted.

Hope to see JB continue to improve.

[remdog]

What's odd to me is that when Jay first came up last year he impressed me with his discipline at the plate. He didn't chase balls, he didn't overswing....basically, he remained within himself and simply looked for a ball to drive.

We all know what a great first two weeks he had. And, we all know that other teams will make adjustments which will, in turn, require Jay to make adjustments. Jay is 22 years old (did he just have a birthday or is that coming up soon? I forget.) He's got a great stroke but he's got to get back to that patience and discipline at the plate that he displayed the first two weeks in the Bigs. If he does that, he'll be fine. The last couple of games in Chicago have been somewhat encouraging.

Having said all of that, personally, I think the key to this season will be the starting staff and not an individual Right Fielder.

Rem

[buckeyenut]

Having said all of that, personally, I think the key to this season will be the starting staff and not an individual Right Fielder.

Rem

Disagree. I think we know that the pitching is going to be there. At this point, we don't have any idea where the offense is going to come from, and that is our biggest issue.

My hope right now is that the pitching can keep this team in the race until mid-summer, by which time the economy will have rebounded with some good news in media and the fans are demonstrating that they will come out to the park for a winner. At that point, maybe Rosales or some of the other kids can come up and have an impact and we can deal for a bigtime bat or two.