55 Wins through 100; Now what?

This is long forgotten territory for me. As a Reds fan, by now, I would be gearing up for Buckeye Football coming shortly in August instead of still caring about the Reds. I would have already banned Reds games in my house as the result of the perennial slide into mediocrity. It’s going to be interesting come September if we are still in the race whether I’ll be able to keep up with both teams and their success.

Then again, most Cubs fans don’t care about games in late April

I haven’t looked at the previous nights results on a regular basis since I’ve been around here and haven’t looked at another teams results in I don’t know HOW long..

Despite not hanging out much lately, I’ve actually been more excited for this year than I have in a long time.. I really think they need to win a playoff series to make it a completely successful. It just seems to me that some of the players are having career years and it’s the right time to take advantage of it.

to track scores when I can’t watch or listen. For those who don’t have the app or a smartphone that does fancy things, you pick your favorite teams for each sport and that score is always at the top of the page. Naturally, the Reds have always had a spot reserved. But now the Cardinals are moving up there too.

It’s like during Buckeye season when everyone’s two favorite teams are the Bucks & whoever’s playing M*ch*g*n. I love it.

It’s a long season; while the 100 game record is great, I think you still need to remember where our expectations started.

No one expected Votto to have the year he’s having (MVP quality); no one expected Rolen to play either as much or as well as he has; no one expected Gomes or Stubbs or Heisey to hit like they have; no one expected Leake or Wood to contribute like they have; no one expected Rhodes to have a career year.

A quick comparison to ZiPS shows that of the hitters, the worst compared to projection is Bruce, who’s only 15 pts. of OPS below; Gomes and Nix are the only two other players hitting worse than projected while 5 of the top 13 hitters by PA have hit more than 100 points above their projection (OCab and Cairo were added to the roster after the projection came out; Cabrera’s probably much worse than projection but Cairo’s probably much better). I doubt many teams can say 9 of their 13 hitters with the most PA have outhit their projections.

The pitching hasn’t been quite as good, but Arroyo’s been about as expected and Leake, Wood, and Cueto (let alone Rhodes) have certainly more than made up for the disappointment of Harang, Cordero, and Masset.

I will say this, though – for the Reds to finish under .500, they’d have to finish 26-36 against some pretty crappy teams; that’s what would piss me off, not their overall record.

But the problem with the pitching is we have great depth but no top line guys. We’re built for the regular season and not the playoffs. The Cards are set ip beautifully for the playoffs, which just means we need to make sure they don’t get there.

The postseason has to be our goal now.

What happened to the 86 Orioles? That’s about 18-64 to finish the season

what happened with the orioles? 18-44 is bad!

glad they got all their winning out of the way then and there.

So what’d you pick in the poll, Caleb? Not sure what this sentiment translates to up there.

05-06 bengals’d.

I’d accept winning just a game or two in the playoffs even if the series is lost.

It’s not a lot, but many teams (including division leaders like Atlanta and Texas) are down.

I was at that last game and had a great time. I love winning and I love that we’re in the race but I just love baseball period so I’ll be here, or somewhere, watching/listening tro the games.

is sublime

We have only had one player not named Adam Dunn have 100+ RBI’s in a season and that was Ken Jr (118) in 2000.
*101 RBI’s at the Catcher position in 2005 by the ValeRue (LaRue / J.Valentin) platoon.

Not even the 99 team had two players with 100+ RBI’s (Vaughn with 118, Casey with 99).

The 1990 WS team Davis was tops with 86.

Not counting the platoon year in 2005, there haven’t been two players with 100+ RBI’s on this team since 1977, Foster (149) and Bench (109).

And while I am at it, not since 1955 have there been three in one year. Klu (113) Wally Post (109) and Gus Bell (104)

SO – Here’s to those lines holding up. That would be sweet.

Only 6 Reds pitchers have logged a higher OPS in a season, and three of those chaps had fewer hits in their best seasons than Leake has already collect in 2010.

Fuck, I need to go back to RR NooB school..

and reply’d

considering it’s 163 games

Though I do remember playoff baseball in Cincinnati, however vaguely.

The Ocrap/BP flop is interesting. But Crapbera has been hitting fairly well since the Break.

but I won’t I’ll save that for when we win the NLCS

Going into the season, we thought we had a crummy team. Turns out we’re substantially better than that. We’ve separated ourselves from the rabble of the Central, and have a great chance to beat the Cardinals. Even if we don’t, the wild card is definitely in play. So far, all of the big trade chips have gone to the AL, so no NL team has really distanced themselves yet. The playoffs are in reach, and at this point in the season, with how the team has performed so far, it is absolutely a disappointment if we don’t make the playoffs.

October is the goal!

Since I think there’s absolutely zero chance that either one of those teams makes the 2nd round of the playoffs.

he’s not doing very well this year, I was going to say they could look at Berkman to find first baseman but he isn’t doing well either.