The Burger Train is once again getting ready to depart the terminal.  This week the stop will be Cincinnati's venerable burger legend Zip's.  There are many folks who swear that Zip's has the best burger in town and I sure didnt know that the restaurant partnered with Bleh-Avril and Sons.  It's been a while since I've been there and I'm interested to determine where this local legend ranks vs some of the other places we've already been.  Im pretty sure that jch will volunteer to take down The Train Wreck(seeing as how he's our resident food mauler)

ZIP'S website

Date:  Wed 6/24

Time: 7pm

Address: Mt Lookout Square

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So Dusty all but made it official yesterday when asked about what would happen when Votto comes back.

“I have to get Hernandez back behind the plate,” said Baker. While he recognizes what Hanigan is doing with the bat, Baker also knows most of his hits are not producing runs. Although he isn’t the Lone Ranger is not driving in runs, Hanigan is hitting .174 with runners in scoring position - .063 with runners in scoring position and two outs.

Hernandez is hitting .304 with runners in scoring posing, .320 with less than two outs.

Baker said this when Hal suggested he move Hernandez to 3rd to keep Hanigan in the lineup.

So the difference in OBP-.411 to .323 apparently doesn't matter.  Neither does the fact that Hanigan is clearly a better defensive catcher.  Since Hanigan didn't get enough hits the 4 or 5 times there was actually a man in scoring position he's going to get benched.

My contention is that no matter what Walt does, this team won't win with Baker making decisions like this.  There's another rumor out there that Bronson is being dangled so the team can get younger.  If that's the case, I think it's time to move on and get a new manager.  Baker just doesn't trust the young guys enough and puts too much stock in fading veterans.  Obviously this won't happen this season, but I think the best offseason move Walt can make is firing Baker. 

Thoughts?

Ok, I know Joey isn't back yet, but I'm quite certain he's gonna be back on Tuesday.  He wants to play, he's been fine in two rehab stints (three I guess - I don't know what happened today), and it is his hometown.  So let's watch together (and Gray's in town so we'll want to treat him to a good old fashioned DC gathering of Reds fans.)

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I'm sure this will be discussed at length in the game thread tonight, but anyway: 

Shortstop Alex Gonzalez was put on the disabled list with an elbow problem. He has four loose bodies floating in the area. He'll have surgery. They're hoping he'll be back in four weeks. He hurt on a swing in the final game with the Braves.

Wilkin Castillo and Danny Richar are being added to the roster. A couple of more moves are coming. Richar has to be added to 40-man. The moves won't be announced until the tell the players affected.

This lineup is slowly becoming Dusty proofed.  Now maybe Cozart can get up to AAA to see what he can do.  Maybe Frazier too?

Kinda felt bad posting this.  You never like to see a guy get hurt, but hopefully some younger guys get a chance now.

BP takes alot of crap for hitting into alot of DP's, but I gotta say, he's da man. When everyone is struggling, he's carrying the offense. I think people forget he's picking up the power drought with Dunn gone, Votto out, and Bruce struggling. Props to BP. 11 HR's so far. He's on pace for 25 HR's and over 100 rbi.

And defensively, he is probably one of the most underrated players in baseball. 3 rbi's yesterday.

So I was watching ASU vs. Texas last night, and our first round pick was pitching.  He's doing pretty well for awhile, and then he gets in a little trouble--one man on, then he hangs a curve which gets pounded to drive the runner home.

And then the color guy and the sideline reporter start talking about how he's clearly shortening his delivery on his curveball to avoid the pain.  WTF?

And then talking about the triceps tendonitis he's been dealing with this season.   FTH?

And then speculating that it wasn't that big a deal because the coaches were watching him closely to make sure his delivery didn't change at all.  Why wasn't Uncle Walt in there with a helicopter to airlift Leake to an undisclosed location?  Or put another way, why did we draft a guy who has a boo-boo?

Turtle, make me feel better on this...

One of my favorite websites has compiled and ranked the worst 15 fathers in sports.  here

I could go into very much detail on the odds my own father overcame to provide a good life for his family but this probably isnt the time or the place.  He had to work incredibly long and hard hours back in the day but i always knew the motivation behind that.  I'd say one of my favorite memories was the pregame ritual of packing a bag of sandwiches and snacks and making a big jug of iced tea to take to Riverfront.  It kept the food cost down and allowed for more money to be spent on souvenirs. 

He didnt, and doesnt to this day, much care for sports but he always found a way to get down to the stadium with me a couple times a summer. There was nothing funner as a  young boy that seeing the Reds and yelling CHAAAAAARRRRRRGGGGGE at the top of my lungs.  

If you are so inclined feel free to post  your favorite memories of your father below.   

So I'm in Saint Louis for a couple of days looking for apartments for the next few years as I make like Eddie Johnson and become a Grown-Ass Man. Well, not really because it's just grad school, but still. I'm moving to Saint Louis. And I figured I would take the opportunity to go to Cardinals-Tigers tonight because, well, its baseball. I didn't bring a camera, though, but it's ok because you're not missing much.

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I havent put one of these up for a while but Im getting tired of banging the same drum beat for the Reds and their lack of offense. I need a bit of a tension breaker.  I noticed in USA Today a little piece on Sequels that wound up being better than the original film. I remember seeing The Empire Strikes Back and not being impressed with it immediately afterwards (hey, i was like 10) but now its easy to judge it superior to the original Star Wars, imho.   I have a few others that I could make cases for but im going to leave the heavy lifting to RR Nation.

What say you, which other sequels are better? 

I'm going to have to nominate The Neverending Story II: The Next Chapter ESPECIALLY considering it was paired with the supremely underrated Bugs Bunny short "Box Office Bunny".

The excitement over the MLB draft prompted me to examine the Jim Bowden draft history.

Jim was responsible for 11 drafts.  The total WAR value of the players he drafted was 96.7.

His best draft was 1998: Kearns(16.0) Dunn (20.8) BJ Ryan(11.4) Coffey(1.4)- total WAR wa 49.6.

2nd best was 1995: Tomko(9.3) Jason Lareu(9.4) Ray King( 1.1) Rob Malkowiak(5.3) Buddy Caryle(.5)- total WAR 25.1. 

3rd best 1994 CJ Nitkowski(.2) A. Boone(5.3) J Reidling(.6)- total WAR 6.1.

The bad years 2001 - no players made the MLB(Sowers was unsigned).  2000- Dustin Mosely and Schroder generated .2 WAR so far.  1996 Buddy Carlyle produced .5 WAR.  1993 Bako(.3) Sullivan(.3) for .6 total.  2003 Wagner (.2) Dickerson(2.1).   Needless to say Jim had alot of real bad drafts.  

The players drafted by Bowden that had positive WAR: 

1.  Dunn(20.8)  2.  Kearns(16.0)  3.  BJ Ryan(11.4)  4. Jason Lareu(9.4) 5. Brett Tomko(9.3)  6.  Joey Votto(5.3)  7.  Aaron Boone(5.3)  8.  Rob Mackowiak(5.3)  9. S. Williamson(3.2) 10. Broussard(3.1) 11.  Dickerson(2.1)  12.  T. Coffey(1.4)  13.  Ray King(1.1)  14.  Denofria(.7)  15.  J. Reidling(.6) 16. Buddy Caryle.  17.  Scott Sullivan(.3) 18.  Scott Bako(.3)  19.  CJ Nitkowski(.2)  20.  Ryan Wagner(.2) 21.  Schroder(.1) 22. Mosely(.1).     

To put into perspective: the As top 12 players drafted from that period produces 165 WAR and all the players from that period would be around 180 WAR.   The Expos/Nats from the same period- top 12 players produced 176 WAR.  But the Nats squandered much of that value by trading Sizemore, Lee, Phillips for Barton Colon and trading Jason Bay for Lou Collier.  

So the bright spot for the Reds is they didnt get alot of value in the draft but they also didnt give much value to the league.  I would guess the Reds are the only organization that for this period only have 3 players at career plus 10 WAR.