- This was in the comments, but it deserves a look on the front page. A Ken Griffey Jr. article from the Seattle PI where Junior says some possibly interesting things about Cincinnati:
He thinks more Reds fans cheer for him "because they've got a chance to see history" than because he's one of the players on their favorite team.
I don't really blame him. There's an entire breed of Reds fan in Cincinnati that is dumb as hell, and completely unforgiving to any player they don't perceive as Pete Rose like. Ryan Freel could get caught snorting coke off a stripper's ass, and people would just laugh. But Ken Griffey Jr. gets hurt laying out for a ball and he gets pounded on talk radio."My home's in Florida. I work in Cincinnati," Griffey said.
"But you grew up there," I said. "Cincinnati's your hometown."
"My home's in Florida. I work in Cincinnati," Griffey repeated. "That 19-year-old kid who's now 37 has a whole different opinion of people. I work in Cincinnati. That's it."
I admit to getting annoyed with the toe injury last September, so I suppose I'm to blame as well, but otherwise I've never felt anything but sick when Junior gets hurt.
Not to mention there's still a lot of racism in Cincinnati, and I think Junior's experienced quite a bit of that since joining the Reds. The average fan might not understand it, but for a fragile personality like Junior it only takes a few comments/letters/encounters to really hit home.
I still think the guy might have been better off in the end doing something besides baseball. Strong statement, but his personality seems very different from the average pro athlete.
- Cut and paste spring training article on the possibility of Kyle Lohse having a big year, but I liked this quote from Dick Pole:
"He's learning a new league," Pole said. "That American League is a little different than it is over here. That's Arena Baseball over there. In this league, you got to take advantage of the eighth and ninth hitters. You can't do that in the American League. They're hitting .300 for crying out loud."
- JinAZ has an awesome review of the 2006 Reds offense. The blue line trend in the first graphs is a little frightening.
- Is Bronson Arroyo the new face of the Reds? Not a bad choice really.
- No individual Opening Day ticket sales this year. Kind of a shame in the respect that it screws the out of towner, but I certainly understand the Reds wanting to maximize revenue. It wouldn't surprise me to see power packs sell out.
- Hey look, its the annual Royce Clayton has a young body article. Thankfully he's wearing a different uniform this go round.
- I really very strongly agree with this article. What stats would you guys like to see on television broadcasts? I'd love to have BA/OBP/SLG/HR/RBI, and I don't think 5 numbers would be too many. Maybe that's just me though.
- Eddie Guardado is still pretty pissed about the way he thinks he was treated in Seattle. Not sure if he has a point though. J.J. Putz kind of had a nice season last year.