Phil Castellini surprised that Opening Day tickets still unsold

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Originally Posted by HammerTime

If your best stretch you can point to in 20 years is 3 years where you won ZERO playoff series then there is a problem. You don’t get bonus points for trying sometimes.

If you run into a “butthead” in the morning, you ran into a “butthead”. If you run into buttheads all day, you're the “butthead”.

The Banana brigade is the problem, not the solution.

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For me, all I care about is being competitive year after year. The playoffs are a crapshoot, I can’t hold a franchise responsible for not winning the playoffs. I hold them responsible for not putting a watchable, competitive team on the field every year.

The problem this ownership has had is that they have only been committed to being competitive for a very short period of their tenure as owners.

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Originally Posted by 757690

For me, all I care about is being competitive year after year. The playoffs are a crapshoot, I can’t hold a franchise responsible for not winning the playoffs. I hold them responsible for not putting a watchable, competitive team on the field every year.

The problem this ownership has had is that they have only been committed to being competitive for a very short period of their tenure as owners.

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As fans, we endure the marathon of the season for hope. Hope that October exists and a trophy lifted.

I too do not ask for a World Series. Look at some of the super teams assembled that never achieved that. I ask for hope, hope and pride that the Reds, our team, are with the best teams all with that same hope.

Hope is not the equivalent of having a good year for 1-3 years every 10 years. That's giving just the brief taste of happiness to remind you what it might be like before taking it away for years... that's torture.

Just checking in now, has anything else wild happened yet today? Did Castellini ritualistically behead Mr. Red on the field this morning or anything?

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Originally Posted by Wonderful Monds

Just checking in now, has anything else wild happened yet today? Did Castellini ritualistically behead Mr. Red on the field this morning or anything?

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He was asking for it. Do you know how expensive his shampoo is? I mean, what are you going to do, report me to the police for beheading Mr. Red? Be careful what you ask for, there are some dark places on the web that would pay top dollar for your beloved Mr. Red head.

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- Phil, probably

He is going on WLW to clarify here shortly.

Lots of hot takes and assumptions on this thread, but I want to tackle one specifically.

Nick Catellanos's quotes about his time spent in Cincinnati as a Red and his love for the fans is pretty obvious.

He absolutely would have stayed had ownership been willing to spend the money they were given by MLB via revenue sharing.

I don't know how everybody's different devices and screen resolution works, but for me, when the "Last Post" is in this thread, this is what shows up on the main index:

Attachment 18202

Given yesterday's meltdown, it now amuses me to no end to imagine what might surprise Phil Castellini! Clearly, he had no clue that if you threaten the fans, they may not like it... I suspect he'd be taken aback that most people don't have 3 houses... and he'd be outright stunned that bad things happen when you combine scotch, cocaine, and stupidity the way he does.

What else surprises Phil Castellini? YOU make the call...

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Originally Posted by Sea Ray

Big picture generalization:

We should be run like the Cleveland Indians*. They trade away players nearing big paychecks for highly sought after prospects. The Reds trade prospects for those players nearing free agency. See Choo and Bauer. In the end, Cleveland enjoys more sustained success despite a lower payroll. I think Krall and Co see that and are making the necessary moves to make that happen. I'm not impressed with the return so far. We've gotten 2 sore armed pitchers and some very young pitchers which is always a crap shoot. The Reds traded young players on the verge of the major leagues in the Bauer, Choo and the Mat Latos deal. That has to stop. It's not sustainable for us to trade such prospects. Latos, Bauer and Choo are long gone while guys like Trammell, Gregorius, Grandal and Boxberger are still playing and had long careers

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In the macro sense, I certainly agree. But I have absolutely zero issues with the three high-profile trades that you mentioned given the state of the franchise at the respective times - i.e going for it.

And while this isn't directed at you, I also have no issues with the Dodgers trade in December of '18, as the franchise was circling the drain with a poorly executed rebuild. The Indians, Rays, A's or Brewers would never have placed their respective franchises in that position in the first place by eschewing the need to add starting caliber MLB talent - not prospects - for four consecutive seasons ('14 Byrd to ' 18 Puig, the Reds` example ) no matter the state of the rebuild. Nor would the previously mentioned teams have packaged Suarez with arguably their best trading chip, which was/is indefensible.

Sent from my SM-T560NU using Tapatalk

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Originally Posted by Bourgeois Zee

Lots of hot takes and assumptions on this thread, but I want to tackle one specifically.

Nick Catellanos's quotes about his time spent in Cincinnati as a Red and his love for the fans is pretty obvious.

He absolutely would have stayed had ownership been willing to spend the money they were given by MLB via revenue sharing.

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yup

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Originally Posted by REDREAD

Well, the county sort of "came ahead". They got all the benefits that WestOfYou talked about. The people that got screwed were the taxpayers. I don't live in Cincy, but I think they got a sales tax increase to pay for the stadium, then when the stadium was paid off, the county never removed the additional sales tax. Someone correct me if I'm wrong.. So the people essentially gave Reds ownership a little bit of money every time they purchased something in the county. They basically took 1/2% paycut to build the GAB on the promise that it would make the Reds competitive.. Instead they got Lindner and the current group laughing all the way to the bank, and Phil telling the fans to shove it.
I hope the voters remember this when Phil C asks for a new park and claims it will make the Reds competitive, and then blames the GAB for his penny pinching.

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They did it as a sales tax of 0.5% in Hamilton County, so the burden wasn't entirely on the Hamilton County tax payers. That was the compromise when the bordering counties told Cincinnati to pound salt. We are also supposed to get a property tax discount every year too. I'm not sure how that is supposed to work, because my property taxes never change unless the home value changes. Nevertheless, there is an article that breaks it down per $100,000 home value. I don't have it at my fingertips. It basically states that sometimes we get the credit, and sometimes we do not, but rarely do we get what was promised. It's based on the sales tax of the county. We tax payers get paid last. Shocking, I know. As far as I know, they're still paying off the two stadiums we have. But I agree with you that tax will likely not go away when the stadiums are paid off. Standard operating procedure.

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Originally Posted by Caveat Emperor

What the Reds don't understand -- and won't, until it's too late -- is that the next generation of sports fans doesn't follow teams, they follow stars. They don't sit and watch full games, they watch highlights of the players they like on TikTok and YouTube.

There has never been a worse era to "play the kids," if you want to attract the attention of a demographic that doesn't watch CBS prime-time programming.

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yep, and other than the brief period of success during the Walt era, the Reds have pretty much sucked since 1999. A few seasons over 500, but mostly losing.
Not sure how they plan to attract young fans like that -- especially when the owner tells the fans to suck it.
It will be interesting to see what happens as MLB's fanbase ages and only the large markets have young fans.

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Originally Posted by Z-Fly

They did it as a sales tax of 0.5% in Hamilton County, so the burden wasn't entirely on the Hamilton County tax payers. That was the compromise when the bordering counties told Cincinnati to pound salt. We are also supposed to get a property tax discount every year too. I'm not sure how that is supposed to work, because my property taxes never change unless the home value changes. Nevertheless, there is an article that breaks it down per $100,000 home value. I don't have it at my fingertips. It basically states that sometimes we get the credit, and sometimes we do not, but rarely do we get what was promised. It's based on the sales tax of the county. We tax payers get paid last. Shocking, I know. As far as I know, they're still paying off the two stadiums we have. But I agree with you that tax will likely not go away when the stadiums are paid off. Standard operating procedure.

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Ok, maybe what I read was that the sales tax was extended longer than it was intended.. or maybe I am remembering completely wrong. In any event, thanks for the clarification.

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Originally Posted by Caveat Emperor

What the Reds don't understand -- and won't, until it's too late -- is that the next generation of sports fans doesn't follow teams, they follow stars. They don't sit and watch full games, they watch highlights of the players they like on TikTok and YouTube.

There has never been a worse era to "play the kids," if you want to attract the attention of a demographic that doesn't watch CBS prime-time programming.

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I suppose the trick is to thread the needle and insist you think you've got a pack of kids - India, Greene, Stephenson, Lodolo, Barrero - who are going to be stars and Reds fans have the chance to watch them as they ascend. Right? You sell people on this being a golden generation.

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Originally Posted by M2

I suppose the trick is to thread the needle and insist you think you've got a pack of kids - India, Greene, Stephenson, Lodolo, Barrero - who are going to be stars and Reds fans have the chance to watch them as they ascend. Right? You sell people on this being a golden generation.

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Until they are arbitration eligible and they move them.

An interesting thread. Reds Twitter has been on it too. I found myself agreeing with Doug a lot too, even though I don't always.

Anyway, I'll just say that I still support the players, but I won't be spending my money on the team in the ways I normally would. I don't live out of town, but would typically fly a couple of times a year to catch games at GAB, but won't be doing that this year. I will catch some of the games with the Yankees and the Mets though, but those are in my backyard and at least I feel like my gate receipts are going primarily to the NY teams and not the Reds (note: I don't know what those splits actually are).

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Originally Posted by LeatherPants

Until they are arbitration eligible and they move them.

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Sure, but they probably ought to leave that part out for the time being.