6/17/11 Toronto Blue Jays Eh

[kaldaniels]

If people over-analyzed the numbers with every team in the league the way they did the Reds, I think the Reds offense would be appreciated a bit more.

[traderumor]

If people over-analyzed the numbers with every team in the league the way they did the Reds, I think the Reds offense would be appreciated a bit more.

I think it comes from day to day following, whereby the forest gets missed for the trees. It is like making conclusions about an opponent based on your team's head to head play. Observation is awesome, but it can also cause one to be confused by facts at times.

[mth123]

April 5.2 RPG
May 4.6 RPG
June 4.8 RPG

Season 4.9 RPG

League Average 4.12 RPG

Comparison to league
Cin 4.89
St. L 4.76
Ariz 4.65
Col. 4.52
Mil. 4.38

I would agree with your point that April was our best offensive month. I would disagree with your conclusion that the offense is "not that good" since they are still top 5 in the league even with their worst month.

Of course, it would be great if we just scored 5 runs every game and let the chips fall where they may with the pitching. But then, that is a basic point of how the game works. I think that enough of the season has been played with our offense remaining at the top in RS to conclude that the offense is good enough. We could use a few breaks in one run games and win some interleague games. But, barring injuries, it appears that this offense is still going to be criticized as not that good when they are leading the league in offensive production two years running. How good is good enough? Not best in their league, then what is it?

I guess I'm one of the rare ones who learned that lesson during the Dunn/Griffey era, when I kept on arguing "more consistent offense" and others said "nah, its the D and pitching, that's where we need to look for improvement."

BTW, the RS/RA for June to date is 72-52 and the record is 9-6. That's 4.8/3.5. I think I see what's happening there. But I suppose we could look to see if those 72 runs had come in a complete even distribution what our record would be. If only the game worked that way.

Well, nobody is saying to let the pitching rot, but this team isn't going to become the '71 Orioles or '95 Braves. The Rotation will continue to be in the bottom third of the league even when they are pitching relatively well. Part of that is the environment that they play in. GABP at home with lots of road games in places like Wrigley, Houston and Milwaukee. If this offense is 5th in the league under those conditions, its not that impressive. If the pitching is in the middle, I'd say that's the best we can do. No reason to keep running black holes out there when alternatives are on hand. Get Cozart up and get somebody like Hermida or Alonso to platoon with Gomes. The LF combo could probably hit in the 5 hole if platooned properly. Rolen would be pushed further down in the order and coupled with Cozart would hopefully add some production at the bottom. A few extra runs here and there could add wins. Why are so many against adding wins?

Ideally, we would resurrect Eppa Rixey and Bucky Walters and stick them in the front of the rotation, but I don't see this team having the cash for any top of the line starters if any became available so lets ensure that this stays a top 3 offense. Barring some black magic with Eppa and Bucky, to win 90 games, any less than one of the top offenses won't do.

[kaldaniels]

Mth...no one is against adding wins. We'd all love an upgrade to LF or SS. But as it stands now the offense is the best in the league, yet people continue to sell it short. A reasonable point as made above is fine, but to speak of how April caused this offense to fool everyone is not.

[cumberlandreds]

Other than the Reds offense looking like it still had jet lag they played a good game. Some really great defense was wasted as was a good pitching perfromance by Leake. Just two or three bad pitches cost Leake. Overall a good game except for the fact they lost. If they play like that defensively and pitching wise most nights this team will be fine.

[mth123]

Mth...no one is against adding wins. We'd all love an upgrade to LF or SS. But as it stands now the offense is the best in the league, yet people continue to sell it short. A reasonable point as made above is fine, but to speak of how April caused this offense to fool everyone is not.

So how many RPG do you see this team averaging over the second half?

The 5.2 RPG that they averaged in April would annualize to an 840+ run powerhouse. The 4.7 or so since then would annualize to a little over 760. IMO that isn't good enough for this team to win much more than 85 games. I keep hearing how they are leading the league in runs, but they aren't the 840 run powerhouse from April. I think many think that they still are. I'd love to have better pitching, but I don't think this team can win 95 games while scoring 760 runs unless they upgrade 3 spots in the rotation.

[kaldaniels]

So how many RPG do you see this team averaging over the second half?

The 5.2 RPG that they averaged in April would annualize to an 840+ run powerhouse. The 4.7 or so since then would annualize to a little over 760. IMO that isn't good enough for this team to win much more than 85 games. I keep hearing how they are leading the league in runs, but they aren't the 840 run powerhouse from April. I think many think that they still are. I'd love to have better pitching, but I don't think this team can win 95 games while scoring 760 runs unless they upgrade 3 spots in the rotation.

If I were able to bet, I would say 4.8-4.9 Runs a game. 4.85 if you want me to pinpoint it. Thats pretty much exactly where they stand seasonlong and for the month of June.

I'm all for improvement though. I'll take an upgrade at a few positions. But if things don't change, I still expect the Reds to be a top-3 offense easily, and if again, I could bet, I would expect them to score more runs than any team in the NL from here on out.

[traderumor]

Well, nobody is saying to let the pitching rot, but this team isn't going to become the '71 Orioles or '95 Braves. The Rotation will continue to be in the bottom third of the league even when they are pitching relatively well. Part of that is the environment that they play in. GABP at home with lots of road games in places like Wrigley, Houston and Milwaukee. If this offense is 5th in the league under those conditions, its not that impressive. If the pitching is in the middle, I'd say that's the best we can do. No reason to keep running black holes out there when alternatives are on hand. Get Cozart up and get somebody like Hermida or Alonso to platoon with Gomes. The LF combo could probably hit in the 5 hole if platooned properly. Rolen would be pushed further down in the order and coupled with Cozart would hopefully add some production at the bottom. A few extra runs here and there could add wins. Why are so many against adding wins?

Ideally, we would resurrect Eppa Rixey and Bucky Walters and stick them in the front of the rotation, but I don't see this team having the cash for any top of the line starters if any became available so lets ensure that this stays a top 3 offense. Barring some black magic with Eppa and Bucky, to win 90 games, any less than one of the top offenses won't do.

If anyone ever wondered what a "red herring" was, see Exhibit A bolded.

I'm still waiting for you to address the question I asked. If leading the league in offense with the same cast of characters, and that cast of characters also is probably the best defensive team in the league, why do folks continue to rail in low scoring losses against the players producing those results? Ok, I'm fine with DFAing Gomes and switching out Cozart for Renteria. But do you really honestly think that is going to take us from a 3 over team to a 95 win team, or even a 90 win team? That is the point I'm really missing here.

[mth123]

If anyone ever wondered what a "red herring" was, see Exhibit A bolded.

I'm still waiting for you to address the question I asked. If leading the league in offense with the same cast of characters, and that cast of characters also is probably the best defensive team in the league, why do folks continue to rail in low scoring losses against the players producing those results? Ok, I'm fine with DFAing Gomes and switching out Cozart for Renteria. But do you really honestly think that is going to take us from a 3 over team to a 95 win team, or even a 90 win team? That is the point I'm really missing here.

You're right, You are missing the point. At 3 games over the winning % was .521. Over 162 games that is 84 wins. If they add 5 wins by scoring some more runs in close games, it might make adding a starter meaningful. An 84 win team isn't going to become a 95 win team by adding an Ace and leaving the rest status quo.

This isn't a case of a magic bullet fixing everything. Adding incremental improvements takes a team from 84 win caliber to 95 win caliber. Part of that is making it harder to wade through the line-up for the opposing pitcher by making improvements in obvious areas of weakness. Those are usually the easiiest spots to improve. Upgrading from a .550 OPS to a .700 OPS from the SS in the 8 hole won't win anything by itself, but its an incremental upgrade that will lead to more production and might convert a close loss or two to a win. Sticking a serious threat in LF that would make it difficult for pitchers to avoid Votto and Bruce doing all the damage would add runs beyond his individual performance. Adding a little production to the bottom of the order by pushing Rolen down and taking away such an automatic out in the 8th spot would make it much more difficult to pitch to this team. They have lost a lot of games where the pitching was good enough and they just didn't score enough runs while the opposing pitcher cruised through the line-up easily. Those are obvious spots to try to improve and improvement will add wins. Nobody thinks these changes will automatically improve the team, but its obvious the current collection of players isn't good enough. So quit frittering the season away and try to improve already.

That is the point being missed. This team needs to add wins where it can get them. Yes, the pitching is awful and the offense scores a lot of runs, but they can't/won't improve the pitching enough to take this team from 84 wins to 95 wins. But just maybe an upgrade at SS, a LF who can fill the 5 hole and a deal for a rotation upgrade could get them there. There is an obvious guy easily available to attempt to upgrade SS who won't cost anything and won't hurt the defense. There are multiple guys who may be able to platoon with Gomes and make that 5th spot in the order very productive and there are lots of other blocked kids who could be dealt to upgrade the rotation. Those incremental improvements aren't coming from sticking with this 25 man roster. Some changes are a phone call away and won't cost anything. Its time to start finding out if those changes can make a difference now, before they pull the trigger on a deal for an ace that empties the farm and still leaves this team short anyway. Waiting just increases the risk of making a huge organizational mistake IMO.