For the Reds blogger or news junkie, these are lean times. With baseball's Winter Meetings upon us, I expected the  "nothing is happening"/"probably nothing will happen" theme to abate, if only momentarily. But just this morning, John Fay dropped a blogpost entitled Jocketty doesn't expect to do much at Winter Meeings. A variation on a theme. Now this isn't at all surprising, given what we've heard all winter. And I don't blame the beat reporters for coming up empty - you can't feast on a half-finished can of Dinty Moore:

Jocketty: That's why we aren't getting involved (John Fay, Dec. 1)

All quiet (Fay, Nov. 29)

Jocketty: Reds may not sign outside FAs (Fay, Nov. 16)

"All is still quiet as far as talks in long-term deals with the arbitration-eligible players." (Fay, Nov. 8)

"Suffice it to say very little is going on." (Fay, Oct. 19)

Either Jocketty is engaged in a fairly extensive and brilliant misinformation campaign, or the Reds are focusing almost solely on shoring up their in-house talent, including singing Votto and Bruce to extensions. But is this where their heads should be, given a handful of very real deficiencies in the roster and what appears to be a reasonable, if modest, amount of payroll flexibility?