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Dusty sez Jonny Gomes has got to get going
though to be fair, he said that about a lot of guys. "(Gomes has) been struggling like a few guys have been struggling," Baker said. "We’ve got to get him going. We’ve got to get Janish going. We’ve got to get Hanigan going. Jay Bruce more consistent. Stubbs has been struggling a little bit lately. But we’ve run into some very good pitching."
Gomes hasn't been awful thus far, and actually, he's been pretty darn good. He's slashing .200/.367/.480 with 25/19 K/BB. If he can keep that up for the entire season, I have absolutely no problem with him as the everyday LF. I think this is a case where some folks are looking at that .200 batting average and suppressing their gag reflex, but as we all know, batting average ain't everything. As long as he's taking walks and clubbing home runs and imitating Adam Dunn, I'm cool with it.
But the question is whether or not he can keep up that .167 ISOd and that .280 ISOp. I don't think he can, but I also think that .200 BA is pretty low. So if he ends up trading a few walks and home runs for singles and doubles like I think he eventually will, I'll be ok. And if he totally sucks out, there's always Chris Heisey. And Fred Lewis. And Todd Frazier and Yonder Alonso. -
With the way Dontrelle Willis has been slicin' up eyeballs down in Louisville
some were worried he may have an out-clause in his minor league contract, something that is fairly commonplace for past-prime veterans who sign looking for a second (or third) chance. Fay did some leg work and found out that Willis has no such clause in his deal. So the Reds can keep him in Louisville all year if it is their wont, and can bring him up to the big league team whenever they see fit. This is good news, as Willis has pitched very well so far (1.13 ERA and a 19/7 K/BB in 24 innings) and it never hurts to have an extra arm laying around. -
Our buddy Chad at RLN cannot emphasize enough his displeasure with Edgar Renteria
He goes so far as to say that if Renteria refuses to play 3B, he should be DFA'd. I'm not sure if I would go that far myself, though. I think Renteria's unwilllingness to play 3B has more to do with his weak-ass arm and old-man reaction times than with any pride or entitlement issues. I will admit that double-switching Renteria in at SS and moving Janish to 3B yesterday, only to see Renteria throw away a double-play attempt on his very first play, was enraging. But he still serves as the only real back up SS we have on the team. My displeasure with the situation is not that Renteria will not/cannot play 3B, but rather that he and Miguel Cairo represent the kind of roster redundancy we haven't seen around here since the Scott Hatteberg/Joey Votto platoon at 1B. -
Injury updates
Johnny Cueto will throw one more rehab outing in AAA before returning to the big league club. Pitching coach Bryan Price: "We'll hope for one more outing where we'll get his pitch count closer to 100 and hopefully get himself into that sixth or seventh inning. That would be a really good sign. It's not imperative, but it would be a bonus, if he could get himself to the sixth or seventh inning."
Also, Jose Arredondo is making progress with his Tommy John rehab, as he's been promoted to AAA after a few weeks in AA. "From the reports I'm getting, all of that stuff is getting a lot better," Price said. "The arm strength is more consistent and the breaking ball and split have been much, much better -- what we expected from him when we got him." So yeah, good news.
This was posted in the FanShots by Justin007000
but I figured it warranted mentioning here in the Reposter. Apparently Barry Larkin likes St. Louis, and so much so that he wanted to play there. "I always loved coming here (St. Louis)...I always thought someday I’d play here. There’s a romance between the players and the fans. That’s how it seems from the outside. I thought that was something I wanted to do."
Here's my take on it: I think if Barry had said this five years ago, or even two or three years ago, we would have reacted with a shrug. But since a bit of a rivalry started last season I think this is getting much more negative attention than it otherwise would have.
Starting tomorrow
if you go to the Reds Hall of Fame and pay full admission, you will receive the first of five Johnny Bench bobbleheads. The giveaway will last through May or until they run out. The series celebrates the new exhibit at the RHoFaM, Johnny Bench: A Celebration of Baseball's Greatest Catcher.
Red Hot Mama updates us on the burgeoning career of young George Kenneth Griffey III
or "Trey" as he likes to be called. It's looking increasingly unlikely that the Griffey family will play into a third generation, as the Kid's kid looks to play football in college. At the risk of editorializing here, that's totally lame.
Howard Megdal hates The Babe!
With great aplomb (for a sports blog, anyway), Megdal eviscerates one of my favorite baseball movies of all time. Granted, I haven't seen the flick in probably 15 years so my affinity for it can almost exclusively be attributed to the fading glow of childhood memories, but this is an outrage! Most of his vitriol towards the film is due to the numerous historical inaccuracies, including: "With the Boston Braves, Goodman is portrayed as a man spitting up blood (he didn't get throat cancer until more than a decade later) who has a runner run out his home runs (against baseball rules, never happened, and the one thing a slowing slugger actually can do is a home run trot). He isn't late-career Babe Ruth; he is late-movie Charles Foster Kane."