Reds hitting against righty pitching

[Kc61]

As my stats thread today shows, the Reds good overall offensive stats are a mirage.

The team has dominant numbers against LHP. Terrific. Votto, Gomes, Stubbs, Renteria, Bruce, Hanigan all above .875 OPS against lefties. Phillips not doing as well this year, but generally has been good against lefties. Rolen too.

This team has very ordinary numbers against RHP. .709 OPS is ninth in the league.

And, you might recall, teams usually face -- RHP.

The Reds have only three position players who bat left handed. Votto, Bruce, Lewis. (And Votto actually hits lefties better than righties.)

This number - 3 lefty bats - is completely unacceptable. The team has no balance offensively.

And the Reds have a short right field porch. Yet they have only three lefty bats.

The Reds need additional lefty bats on the team. If the Reds add a righty cleanup hitter, he has to hit righties well.

IMO, this is the primary problem with the offense. They hardly ever have good matchups against tough righty pitchers.

[RedsManRick]

Another argument in favor of Beltran. Having a switch hitter in the clean-up spot would be real nice.

[mace]

This goes a long way in explaining how the club is falling short of its Pythag. In the vast majority of games, they're a below-average hitting team--in spite of leading the league in runs scored for most of the season.

Also, after dragging the bottom of the pitching stats for most of the year, the Reds are now eighth in the NL in runs allowed. The sharp improvement there suggests that, over the past month or more, the team has pitched pretty dang well.

The biggest need is hitting.

[Kc61]

The middling numbers against RHP also cries out for the promotion of Yonder Alonso.

Juan Francisco, had he stayed healthy, could have helped against righties this year. He has been a dominant bat against righties. But he got hurt twice. And, with Cairo the major fill-in at third, there really wasn't a spot for Juan. (Let's not argue about his walks, he's hurt and not in the picture.)

But Alonso is healthy. IMO, the Reds need Yonder far more than they need, say, Gomes. Yonder could play some left field, pinch hit, and occasionally spell Votto - ironically, against RHP where Joey is less dominant.