the runs scored/allowed theory

[jmac]

i think you call it the polygarethimem(????????:rolleyes: )theory.okay...dont know how to spell it.i read alot of gloom and doom people on this board.i am wondering if you should be that pessimistic right off. yes our starters are probably 6th in our division.but our offense should be as of now 1 or 2...you would think.
last season we had
milton with 6+ era
hudson 6+
ortiz 5.38

barring no trades in 06 if these guys at least equal last season or in miltons case his normal career era avg , you would have
harang 3.8
claussen 4.2
williams 4.4
milton lets say he gets it down to 4.7
say start #5 has a 5.10 era

i doubt hudson will be #5.ortiz and graves (7+era) now elsewhere.
if our above rotation could "at the least" equal those #'s.....can you that do the poly.....thing figure out how things may look.
i remind people with a #1or #2 offense those #'s might not be that bad tho milton will have to step it up a little.

[westofyou]

i am wondering if you should be that pessimistic right off.
Before 2003 the Reds had one season with a team ERA above 5.00 in the 20th century and one in the 19th.

They have 3 in the 21st.

Worst NL team ERA's since 2003

ERA YEAR ERA PCT
1 Rockies 2004 5.54 .420
2 Rockies 2003 5.24 .457
3 Reds 2004 5.21 .469
4 Reds 2005 5.18 .451
5 Rockies 2005 5.14 .414
6 Reds 2003 5.09 .426
7 Brewers 2003 5.03 .420
8 Diamondbacks 2004 4.98 .315
9 Padres 2003 4.87 .395
10 Diamondbacks 2005 4.87 .475

[jregensb]

I want to believe.

The notion that Milton could not possibly replicate his 2005 performance is enticing. I also like hearing people pump up Belisle as the answer to the #5 hole. Meanwhile, Ortiz is gone and Harang is poised for a breakout season.

Now if someone would repost those rosy numbers showing how the team ERA plummeted after Gullett left, we'll have typed up a very good pitching staff.

Yippee!

[wheels]

Ahhh...Yes.

The "Ortiz is gone" theory.

Would be nice had they not brought in Dave Williams and all of his stinkiness.

Milton's not going to get better...Well, maybe window dressing better, but he's on a downward spiral because of a degenerative injury, and any improvement will be more a product of luck than anything else.

Harang's proven himself as the lynchpin of the staff, and it wouldn't be crazy to submit that Claussen could be next year's Harang, but after those two we're left with Chaff, Dreck, and Poo, with an occasional cameo by a fella named Tripe.

In other words, the starting staff will be there to hand out runs to their opponents at a prolific pace yet again, and the offense would need to score in excess of 900 runs to make the club competitive.

That doesn't happen very often.

[M2]

It's called the Pythagorean Theorem (c'mon jmac, we all learned it in high school geometry).

And who's being pessimistic? The Reds have a horrible pitching staff. All they've done this offseason is swap out Ramon Ortiz for Dave Williams, who's every bit as bad as Ramon Ortiz, and add a LOOGY. Things don't get better until the pitching gets fixed. As 2005 amply demonstrated, the Reds can lead the NL in runs and still stink because of this pitching staff.

Also, as we've learned over the years, there's a bottomless pit of bad-to-horrible pitchers out there to step up when the last set of bad-to-horrible pitchers leave. Attrition doesn't fix the problem. The names may change, but the suckitude stays the same. What fixes the problem is replacing those bad pitchers with good ones and, so far, the Reds haven't done that this offseason.

[SteelSD]

It's called the Pythagorean Theorem (c'mon jmac, we all learned it in high school geometry).

And who's being pessimistic? The Reds have a horrible pitching staff. All they've done this offseason is swap out Ramon Ortiz for Dave Williams, who's every bit as bad as Ramon Ortiz, and add a LOOGY. Things don't get better until the pitching gets fixed. As 2005 amply demonstrated, the Reds can lead the NL in runs and still stink because of this pitching staff.

Also, as we've learned over the years, there's a bottomless pit of bad-to-horrible pitchers out there to step up when the last set of bad-to-horrible pitchers leave. Attrition doesn't fix the problem. The names may change, but the suckitude stays the same. What fixes the problem is replacing those bad pitchers with good ones and, so far, the Reds haven't done that this offseason.

Yup. And if I have to weather another offseason where folks demand that the pitching "MUST" be better than it was last year, I'm going to start tearing my hair out. Ditto for any argument that includes the concept that Run Differential is, in essence, meaningless. I mean, it'd be an easy counter considering that we've been hearing that for at least three seasons now, but yeesh...how long must it continue before folks figure out that a team must score more Runs than it allows to have a shot in all but the worst of divisions?

Double ditto when the players you're counting on in your bullpen are 36 (Weathers), 38 (Mercker), and 40 (Hammond). Triple ditto when only one of the top three projected SP on your roster (Harang) didn't get ERA-lucky. Quadruple ditto that when the remainder of your rotation includes Eric Milton and a combination of Paul Wilson, Luke Hudson, and AAA chaff. Quintuple ditto that when the last two pitchers who've been chased HARD in the last two offseasons have been Eric Milton and Matt Morris.

The problem should have been easy to fix considering the offense. It really should have. Get good pitchers who can retire hitters. Three-point-five offseasons. Not a single SP who can actually do that on a consistent basis.

[Ravenlord]

assuming the projected Reds staff hits their exact career norms in runs allowed (and that's a prickley subject in of itself), you get:

Harang (projected at 34 starts) 91 runs
Milton (projected at 32 starts) 111 runs
Claussen (projected at 31 starts) 93 runs
Wilson (projected at 28 starts) 90 runs
Williams (projected at 28 starts) 86 runs
Belisle 36 runs
Coffey 33 runs
Hammond 23 runs
Hancock 28 runs
Hudson 40 runs
Mercker 26 runs
Wagner 23 runs
Weathers 37 runs
total 717 runs...that doesn't involve the reality of the Reds using more than 13 pitchers, the five projected starters only have 153 games between them, Milton won't hit his career averages, Hudson will see time as a starter, Mercker, Hammond, and Weathers are archaic, Wilson's coming off surgery while being old, having a horde of flyball pitchers in Cincinnati, an excessively poor defesne, especially in the outfield, and the list could go on. it will be just as bad as lost year, if not worse (which i personally think it will be).

[Reds Nd2]

it will be just as bad as lost year, if not worse (which i personally think it will be).

After re-watching a few of the Reds games from last season, hey even a sadist can have their masochistic bent, I personally think the Reds are going to miss Casey's defense in '06. This season is going to be fugly to watch.