what happened to the offense?

[Will M]

Since June 15th (29 games):

12-0 L Kuroda
1-0 L C Lee
5-1 L Felix
1-0 L some guy named Ryan Rowland Smith (ERA 6.18)
3-1 L Randy Wells
3-0 L Santana
1-0 L Halladay
1-0 L Hamels
1-0 L Cook

Thats nine games in the last 29 where the team has scored zero or only one run. Now there are some fine pitchers on the above list but even really good pitchers don't have ERAs of zero. the FIVE 1-0 losses really stand out.

I strongly believe that this team will not play in October unless Walt/Bob do something to boost the offense. Replacing the Corkster with Ramon & replacing Nix with Dickerson will help but I think the team needs more than that.

[Falls City Beer]

Jay Bruce has fallen off a cliff. And Gomes has regressed some . Rolen's been sporadic.

[Crosley68]

Since June 15th (29 games):

12-0 L Kuroda
1-0 L C Lee
5-1 L Felix
1-0 L some guy named Ryan Rowland Smith (ERA 6.18)
3-1 L Randy Wells
3-0 L Santana
1-0 L Halladay
1-0 L Hamels
1-0 L Cook

Thats nine games in the last 29 where the team has scored zero or only one run. Now there are some fine pitchers on the above list but even really good pitchers don't have ERAs of zero. the FIVE 1-0 losses really stand out.

I strongly believe that this team will not play in October unless Walt/Bob do something to boost the offense. Replacing the Corkster with Ramon & replacing Nix with Dickerson will help but I think the team needs more than that.

I agree completely and have been feeling this way for almost a month also. It seems that The Reds are good at "piling on" which makes the stats appear solid.

[Falls City Beer]

Bruce has a .400 OPS in 51 ABs in July.

[WVRedsFan]

Remember early on when the bottom of the order came through with some timely hits and RBI's? Hernandez, Stubbs, Hanigan, Gomes--all of them contributed for some runs. Except for the occasional home run from Gomes or Stubbs, the hitting isn't there. Corky Miller is a black hole at the plate and any time you don't have Rolen in the lineup it hurts.

It also doesn't help that Phillips isn't hitting right now, Votto is pushing by swinging early in the count (Heather, tell Joey to go back to the way he used to handle plate appearances ), and Jay Bruce is just lost at the plate. It doesn't help that Dusty marches out Laynce Nix everytime he wants to spell Gomes and Bruce (Nix has a .265 OBP and dropping) and leaves Heisey on the bench. And forget about Dickerson--he gets hurt often and has many of the same problems Bruce and Nix have at the plate.

This team needs another genuine MLB hitter to play in left and right when Gomes and Bruce go through their spells (and Stubbs, too)--or even start. Will it happen? Nah. the Reds value so much fodder that I expect them to go aftter more pitching (not that it's not needed in the bullpen) and stand pat. That's the the formula for some time,

[*BaseClogger*]

Regression to the BA w/RISP mean...

[Ron Madden]

Regression to the BA w/RISP mean...

I was just thinking the same thing.

[Caveat Emperor]

The four 1-0 losses are really the sickening part. Teams that lose 1-0 games on such a regular basis don't deserve to make the post season.

[Falls City Beer]

How about a straight platoon of Heisey/Bruce in right and acquire a lefty complement to Gomes in left? Biggest boost to the offense/littlest impact on the defense.

[Marc D]

If you look at the runs by game you find the data is right skewed (mean > median by almost a full run). This recent run of extremely low scores, statistically speaking, could be nothing more than good ol' regression to a symmetrical distribution.

for those who care:

[OnBaseMachine]

Five 1-0 losses within a month. I've never seen that happen before.

[WVRedsFan]

How about a straight platoon of Heisey/Bruce in right and acquire a lefty complement to Gomes in left? Biggest boost to the offense/littlest impact on the defense.

That's what I'm talking about.

Reds are 14-12 over the last month in which they scored 115 runs and allowed 78. Not bad, but when you consider that included 10-3, 12-0, 14-3, and 8-1 wins, the picture gets murky. Over the last ten, the Reds are 4-6, have been shutout 4 times, 3 times 0-1. Not good.

You can win with good pitchingm, which I believe we have, but you must score runs. In the last ten games, the Reds have failed to score 3 or less runs in 7 games. You cannot expect to stay with the Cardinals with that kind of offense. Time to cut Nix, get Hernandez back and send Corky back to his environment in AAA, and find some offensive outfield help, Dickerson is not your answer and the platoon in right field makes too much sense for the Reds to try it because they are so sold on Bruce. We'll see what happens.

[Brutus]

The four 1-0 losses are really the sickening part. Teams that lose 1-0 games on such a regular basis don't deserve to make the post season.

The Reds' offense has been woefully inconsistent, and most definitely needs to bring it a little more often. However, they're still leading the NL in Runs, OBP, SLG and OPS. That has to count for something, I think.

There has already been 175 shutouts this season in Major League Baseball (252 all of last year, which was a lot more than the several years prior). The 1-0 games have been happening at an alarming rate this year around baseball. I think people need to stop expecting the type of offensive output from teams they've seen the last 10-15 years and judge the team relative to its peers. And again, the Reds statistically have scored more runs than anyone in the league.

[TheNext44]

This past month the Reds have scored around a run less a game than the rest of the season (4.2 to 5.1) Still, even at 4.2 runs the rest of the way, they will score more runs than most projections had them at the beginning of the year.

To put more plainly what others have said, the Reds were on a hot streak for the first 60 games, and now are in a slump. Just as it was silly to expect them to continue to score 5.1 runs a game, it's just as silly to assume that this slump will last all season.

[OnBaseMachine]

I wonder how many runs the Reds are scoring per game against teams not named the Pirates/Astros/Cubs?