The players havent changed, many have gotten better in fact.
Therefore, there is only one move to make to get us back to where we were last year.
Fire Dusty, right now, get some life in that dugout, and fire up these guys.
Dont wait, do it now.
The players havent changed, many have gotten better in fact.
Therefore, there is only one move to make to get us back to where we were last year.
Fire Dusty, right now, get some life in that dugout, and fire up these guys.
Dont wait, do it now.
The Reds need to stand pat for a month and then see where they are at, there is no need to panic or make any snap decisions regarding players or management.Originally Posted by mrherd05
I was thinking trade Joey Votto
Isn't Dusty Baker the same manager that took Cincy to the NL Central championship last year? Isn't he a three-time NL Manager of the year?
Better idea: option mrherd05 to some Double-A Chattanooga Redszone forum?
I'm not a big Dusty fan but the starting pitching sucks and we have holes in our offensive lineup. This is a small market organization that is at it's highest payroll ever ($81M). They won't be adding payroll/players by trade.
They are going to war with what they have.
Everyone (including me) wants to see some trades to improve the club? We may get our wish at the trade deadline if the Reds are 8 to 10 games out of first place (small fire sale of guys like Cordero, etc.). This team might look a wee bit different come next season.
Wow, what a shocker that you came up with this
Who was the manager last year when we rallied in mid August and took over the Central and clinched the division?
What in the heck is the Reds starters ERA? 5.50
Simply put, we all overrated our starting pitching
Well, if Arroyo was the Arroyo of 2010.......
If Wood was the Wood of 2010..........
Bailey seems better but he can't stay healthy.........
Cueto is getting better every year..........
Volquez was rushed back too quickly..........
Leake is young and caught the league by storm as an unknown quantity in 2010........
Chapman should be groomed as a starting pitcher in Louisville...........
I rarely agree with you, as I am not what one would call a Dusty fan, at all. However, you're spot-on here. SP is the Reds' biggest problem. I put a lot more value on in-game management and who plays than whatever else goes on for a manager, so I think Dusty has certainly done his share to hurt the team this year. Even so, the biggest problem so far has been SP, and you can put me in the camp that believes that if the opportunity presents itself, a deal for good SP must be made -- I'm talking someone good, not something like the Cardinals did last year, dealing for the ever-mediocre Jake Westbrook.
If a pitcher is good and young, the cost in talent to be given up to get him would probably be prohibitive (If he was even on the trading block).
If a pitcher is good and been around awhile, the cost in money is probably prohibitive.
Rock meet hard place.
baker 12 hit the nail on the head
The players haven't changed but I don't know about "many have gotten better"
Going down the list, imo....
Votto- perhaps better, perhaps down a little, perhaps about the same. It's hard to say because they're pitching him differently this year than they did for most of last year.
Phillips- Probably better in some ways. Overall he still is who he is. He's the best defensive second baseman in the game who's OBP is going to be largely batting average driven. He still doesn't take many walks but it almost seems like he gets better defensively every year, which boggles the mind. Not going to go hunting for a bunch of stats, especially for defensive ones,which tend to be the most highly disagreed upon anyway.
Janish-substantially worse offensively, and thus far Renteria has been worse offensively than Cabrera was, imo. Renteria will take a walk and has been brought up at times by Thom Brennaman on the telecasts, he sometimes picks it up a notch late in games. But overall we've got nothing offensively from the SS position.
Rolen- Much worse than where he was at last year. Last year he was an All Star. This year he's about a .250 or below hitter with 2 home runs. Love the guy, love his career, but when the guy who you had as your clean up hitter does that, it drags down your team. You can say he's not the clean up hitter, or should not be, but that is where Dusty put him to start the year, so that was his anticipated spot and role.
Hernandez/Hanigan- Call it a wash. Hernandez is better/healthier, Hanigan is worse. It may indeed be luck with Hanigan, luck as in bad luck. Haven't checked his babip. But the bottom line is luck or no luck, he is not putting up the solid average we've come to expect from him. Hernandez has been very good thus far though.
Gomes- Much much worse, and he took a beating in these parts last year after May. Love the effort, hate the results.
Heisey- probably about the same
Stubbs- about the same... he's made some progress but at this point not as much as it appeared he had earlier in the year.
Bruce- better, though I'm still interested to see if/when/and for how long the bad streak is coming. We all know how talented and touted he is and was as a prospect. He's been a streaky hitter throughout his career too up here, so we'll see.
Miguel Cairo- about the same, though I expect he'll drop off
Volquez- obviously didn't have him most of last year, but worse... much much, MUCH worse. He had a bad outing in the playoffs last year and some other clunkers, but this year he's pitched like someone without a clue most of the time.
Arroyo- worse, although as we know with Bronson, and as Dusty mentioned after his last start, every year he goes through a rough patch and every year thus far he comes out of them. You do have to take into consideration mono and back problems, but still, results up to this point are results, and they're worse.
Cueto- continues to progress and get better, needs to stay healthy
Bailey- continues to progress and get better, seemingly can't stay healthy
Wood- even though he shows signs of being able to pitch, overall much worse
Leake- hard to say, probably need a good statistical analysis and comparison. He's obviously not as good as he was when he first came up in terms of results, not as bad as when he wore down or the league figured him out after several starts last year. So I guess "too early to tell", or about the same.
Cordero- better
Masset- about the same
Bray- better
Ondrusek- probably better, despite the grand slam to Kemp
Chapman- obviously worse, whether it was mechanics, injury, or the combination thereof
Lecure- about the same
Maloney(for all his action)- probably worse, I don't know, don't know why I even mentioned him
So there it is. I'm probably forgetting somebody, and it's just my opinion, with no stats listed. But I fail to see how most of the players have gotten "better".
Our production on the entire left side of the field has taken a nose dive (SS,3B, LF). When you consider that 3B(Rolen) and LF (mostly Gomes) were positions that Dusty was counting on to be run producing ones, that hurts. Rolen is old, Gomes is just not that good. Janish never has been out there for his bat, but the other players sliding downward exposes him more.
Since it's early June, it's hard for me to say definitively that many players are clearly better, as they still have more than half a season to streak downward and upward.
About the only one that I would say is markedly better than last year from the results is Cordero. I guess he's in better shape and it's paid off so far.
Cueto may be better but he was already pretty decent. He does seem to be learning and progressing more or less the way you would like, so that is a good sign.
Bailey looked better, but can he stay healthy?
Votto- again depends on how you look at it.... power numbers- a little worse... OBP... even better
Bruce- better, let's hope he keeps it up
Phillips- maybe better, again it depends, it's too early to say. He's basically the same player to me.
Bray's better but they're asking him to do less as basically a LOOGY.
Ondrusek looks to be progressing, again despite the grand slam.
But the bottom line is out of a starting rotation that "should have" started the year had everyone been healthy of Volquez, Arroyo, Cueto, Bailey, and Wood,
only Bailey and Cueto have been better and more or less reliable every single time out there. And they weren't healthy to start the year, and Bailey got hurt again after he came back.
So you're talking about 60% of your starting rotation being worse than what they were last year... and Arroyo will probably turn it around, hopefully they all will.... but 60% of your starting rotation is worse than last year, and the 2 guys who are better have already had health issues this year.
So, I'd be interested to see how that is Dusty Baker's fault. Don't get me wrong, I'm not the biggest Dusty supporter. But the players by and large like him, so I don't think replacing him is going to motivate your starting pitchers to all of a sudden start getting more people out.
pitching, pitching, pitching and...well pitching, are to blame for where we are right now. Our rotation is a rotating door and we just have no consistency, and NOW our bullpen is shot to heck because of it. Dusty has actually gotten better (imho) with age. He doesn't run his pitchers out there to tear their young arms up like he used to, he keeps tinkering with the lineup because of something doesn't work, he is making sure that we don't stick with it. With a crappy shortstop and a problem in left field, he is doing the best he can. Keep Dusty, sign a new shortstop/left fielder/starting pitcher.
I sure hope you are right. So does Jose Arredondo. Arredondo is coming off TJ surgery and did not pitch in 2010. He has been up with the team for 21 games. Dusty has used him 12 times for 11.67 innings. That is a pace for 92 games and 90 innings in a season. Yikes! About a week ago in Fay's blog, Dusty was quoted as saying they had to monitor Arredondo's innings closely. I suppose Dusty feels the best way to monitor those innings is to have Arredondo stand on the mound and fling the baseball.Dusty has actually gotten better (imho) with age. He doesn't run his pitchers out there to tear their young arms up like he used to.
Some other numbers. Masset and Ondrusek tied for third in appearances. Bray tied for sixth. Ondrusek third in innings pitched. Masset tied for fourth. Bray has more reasonable numbers in this category.
The starting pitching, or lack of, has certainly forced Dusty's hand in a number of instances. I just hope by the time the starting rotation gets straightened out that the bullpen isn't going down the drain from being used so often.
It's a fine line. The Reds can't afford to fall much further back in the standings, but they can't afford to burn out their bullpen either. The starters simply must pitch deeper into games, either by pitching well or by falling on their swords a time or two for the team's sake.
Last edited by texasdave; 06-06-2011 at 10:31 AM.
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