I've read a few articles that quoted Dunn saying that he likes hitting in the first inning, in eighther the two or three spot.
I"ve read some articles that quoted Phillips saying that he's uncomfortable batting third.
I believe that Dusty is uncomfortable putting Dunn in the two or three hole.
I believe that Dusty believes that Dunn strikesout too much and might clog the bases hitting second or third. Just another reason I doubt the wisdom of Dusty Baker.
That is just downright disgusting; but I don't listen to WLW. I use to - when they were good, but not anymore.
Isn't Cunningham still the program director/station manager, or something of that sorts? If so. Then that reveals a lot.
The station has really come a long way (in the wrong direction) since the days of Rosemary Clooney, Bob Braun, and Ruth Lyons.
I tune in on the way to work in the evenings only to listen to the game.
When I heard that Jr got traded, and again while on my way to work, I tuned in and listened to Scott Sloan's show. The guy is a real duffus who showed no class or respect at all.
Dragged?
In 1999, soon-to-be free agent Ken Griffey Jr (and his agent) boxed the Mariners into a corner by saying they'd accept a trade ONLY to the Reds. The Ms offered him a contract of nearly $150 million to keep him with the team forever, and Griffey Jr. somehow reached the conclusion that the team did not want him. Jim Bowden, the Reds' general manager, negotiates a staggeringly one-sided deal for one of the greatest players in history, and signs Jr to a 9 year 116.5 mil contract (with deferred monies until 2024).
Dragged? For that kind of deal you can tie me behind a car and drag my bare butt across two miles of broken glass.
And lets also not forget who was standing (and beaming) next to him on that podium the day he was signed. His Dad, who had hopes/aspirations of managing the Reds (and his son) in a Cincy uniform.
Jr wasn't some innocent victim in all this who was somehow deceived (or duped) by management to come to Cincy.
Last edited by GAC; 08-02-2008 at 04:55 AM.
"In my day you had musicians who experimented with drugs. Now it's druggies experimenting with music" - Alfred G Clark (circa 1972)
Okay so ownership forgot to "drag" some other players, especially pitchers to play along with Griffey. I guess all they needed was Griffey and the new stadium to sell tickets. Just a minor oversight on the ownership/investors part.
At least they got your money......
Sure, Bowden is the virtue of truth and full disclosure, I mean, I look up the word "honest" and right there is a picture of Bowden, and we all know how well Reds ownership has treated the tax payers on that shiney new stadium, after all "we are building for 2003", still. Why would some superstar not take less than he could have received elsewhere just for funsies, who wouldn't love to come to Cincy, taking less knowing that he was going to play on a losing team for what seven, eight seasons?Jr wasn't some innocent victim in all this who was somehow deceived (or duped) by management to come to Cincy.
Last edited by Spring~Fields; 08-02-2008 at 07:55 AM.
I hadn't heard this, I came across it this morning in the power rankings, according to BP, Junior's approval of the trade hinged on him being allowed to play CF.
Kenny Williams finally gets his man, acquiring longtime trade target Ken Griffey Jr. and handing over the keys to center field. Griffey's approval was said to hinge on returning to his old stomping grounds (we know how picky he can be when it comes to the desire to go home), which means he'll push Nick Swisher to first base and struggling Paul Konerko (.214/.312/.349, and an even worse .209/.274/.284 since returning from injury three weeks ago) to the bench. Though that may not be a popular move, it comes at a negligible cost (Danny Richar and Nick Masset), and in a tight division race, that's a chance worth taking.
Last edited by hebroncougar; 08-02-2008 at 08:07 AM.
/r/reds
RUMBLE!!!!!!!!!!
http://sports.yahoo.com/mlb/news?slu...v=ap&type=lgns
I want video!!
Cedric 3/24/08It's absolutely pathetic that people can't have an opinion from actually watching games and supplementing that with stats. If you voice an opinion that doesn't fit into a black/white box you will get completely misrepresented and basically called a tobacco chewing traditionalist...
The Kid, reborn with the White Sox
By Jeff Passan, Yahoo! Sports Aug 4, 5:57 pm EDT
Yahoo! Sports
They were all there. The manager. The general manager. When Ken Griffey Jr. saw the owner, too, worry set in. “I thought I was in trouble,” he said.
They told him to sit down, Dusty Baker and Walt Jocketty and Bob Castellini, the Cincinnati Reds’ brass. They apologized for interrupting his lunch. They had something to tell him. They wanted to trade him to the Chicago White Sox. They needed to know if he would approve.
Griffey smiled. If there’s anything prettier in Ken Griffey Jr.’s world than his swing, it’s his smile. It’s got different incarnations: the reserved one follows a home run, the joker one after a particularly good knee-slapper, the beaming one after a good deed by one of his kids. This was the classic one, the one made famous on his 1989 Upper Deck card, the one that, even though he’s pushing 40, reminds us that he is and always will be The Kid.
Finally, after 8½ seasons in Cincinnati – 8½ eminently frustrating years in which the Reds never surrounded Griffey with the players they promised, and Griffey never stayed healthy enough to deliver the kind of performance they expected – he was off to a team in contention. Pending his approval, which meant the approval of his wife, Melissa, and that wasn’t too difficult a sell.
“She understands why I’m still playing,” Griffey said. “I have enough money to take care of my family for generations. I’m still playing because I love baseball. I still have something to accomplish.”
Griffey lounged into a black leather couch. He didn’t need to say that his fingers remain naked after 20 major-league seasons. No ring, let alone a World Series appearance. Everything – 600 home runs, $150 million in contracts, 13 All-Star appearances, 10 Gold Gloves, one faux Presidential campaign and the respect and admiration as the greatest presumably clean star of his generation – except a championship chance.
So, yeah, even before consulting with Melissa, he had a good idea that he’d need to call his broker to find a place in Chicago. Griffey went back to the lunch table and sat down nonchalantly. This smile was sly, the sort Griffey often used when talking with Adam Dunn, his best friend on the Reds.
“I got traded,” Griffey said.
Dunn’s response, G-rated: No you didn’t.
“I got traded,” Griffey said again, and this time, Dunn could tell he was serious.
He wasn’t quite sure how to respond, either, because Griffey’s name had come up enough times in trade talks that you’d think he had his own article in NAFTA. No deal ever worked out, a combination of Griffey’s hefty contract and the waning impact of his bat.
Still, White Sox general manager Ken Williams saw Griffey as the final bat to push his pitching-rich team into the playoffs, even if his .432 slugging percentage is his lowest since his rookie season in ‘89. Gears don’t move as well as they used to. It’s part of aging, Griffey joked. In his teens, he could start training for the season in February. In his 20s, it was January. Now? November.
Which makes him wonder: Is it worth it? For now, the answer is yes. Griffey is looking forward to hitting the free-agent market for the first time in his career, even if it was undeniably rude to late-30s, Hall of Fame-caliber talent this offseason. He’s got plenty of time to watch his eldest son, Trey, race souped-up go-karts, and see his daughter, Taryn, play travel-team basketball, and encourage his baby, 6-year-old Tevin, in tackle football games.
“Trey tells me I should keep playing until he goes to college,” Griffey said. “Because he knows that as long as I’m playing, I’m not around to enforce the rules. He’s a smart kid.”
Retirement is a dirty word to Griffey. It signals the end of something: for him, a great career that should have been even better, and for an entire generation that wore its hats backward in tribute to Griffey, a simpler time right before steroids turned baseball into Byzantine mess.
Nick Swisher, who will share time with Griffey in center field for the White Sox, grew up with posters of Junior on his wall. He sat across from Griffey on the couch, punching the buttons of his PSP, talking trash in a tennis game with pitcher D.J. Carrasco.
“A couple of ballplayers playing tennis,” Griffey said. “Look at that.”
Swisher laughed. Ken Griffey Jr. was ripping him. How cool.
For the rest of Griffey’s career, however long it is, such sentiment will trail him. As much as he wants to live in the present, his past remains so woven in baseball’s fabric that differentiating the two is difficult, unless Griffey can unlock his power stroke one more time and push the White Sox past pesky Minnesota and a Detroit team that won’t die.
It’s rather odd, as it is, seeing him in the White Sox uniform. The images are so indelible, him as a superstar in a Mariners uniform and an aging star in a Reds one, that anything different takes some getting used to.
And, really, that’s for all parties involved. Griffey talks about how he played with Dewayne Wise and knows Jermaine Dye – and then remembers playing against Ozzie Guillen, his manager, and Williams, his boss. He sidles into center field nightly, for the first time since 2006, aware that he doesn’t move like he used to – and then does it, because he wants to believe he can play the position. He swings and misses on a 90-mph fastball – and then turns on one that clocks in at 92 and thrashes a single to right field, just to remind everyone that some bat speed remains.
Junior runs to first base, rounds the bag and smiles, the classic one again. He’s on a baseball field, in a pennant race, fighting for that jewelry, The Kid reborn.
http://sports.yahoo.com/mlb/news;_yl...yhoo&type=lgns
I'm sorry to say, but Griff didn't look so hot in CF last night, he let a ball get up the gap on him for a triple. Sad to see, and if the Chisox plan on playing him in CF, they are hurting.
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