This Day in Reds History: Cincy deals Deno

On this day in 1941, the Reds traded righty Johnny Hutchings to the Braves for Hall of Fame centerfielder Lloyd Waner. "Little Poison", as Waner was known, was never half the player that his brother Paul was, but Lloyd put up a pretty putrid line in his half season in Cincinnati: .256/.291/.293 (65 OPS+).

On this day in 1953, the Reds acquired lefty Fred Baczewski and righty Bob Kelly from the Cubs in exchange for righty Bubba Church.

On this day in 1973, the Reds traded righty Mike Johnson, leftfielder Gene Locklear, and cash considerations to the Padres for lefty Fred Norman. Before I started writing TDIRH, I knew Norman's name and that was about it. However, he's probably one of the more underrated pitchers in Reds history. In an era where win totals were everything, Norman never posted more than 14 wins with the club. Norman was better than his win totals indicated as he threw about 1300 innings with the Reds at a 106 ERA+ clip. That's obviously not ace material, but he was a nice player to have on the club. In some ways, his career with the Reds mirrors Bronson Arroyo's stint with the team.

On this day in 2000, Bronson Arroyo made his major league debut with the Pirates. He threw five innings and allowed five runs on 10 hits and two walks while striking out one. Despite his rocky start, Pittsburgh rallied in the ninth and eventually defeated the Braves in extra innings, 7-6.

Arroyo has carved out a Reds Hall of Fame type career since joining Cincinnati in 2006. He has a 4.05 ERA (106 ERA+) in nearly 1600 innings with the team. His performance hasn't been flashy, but he has a big season to his name with his great year in 2006 and a track record of durability and above-average pitching. I have the impression that the bar is higher for pitchers when it comes to the Reds Hall of Fame, but the team has honored hurlers such as Jack Billingham and Brooks Lawrence. If you honor those guys, and I'm not arguing that you shouldn't, then you pretty much have to honor Arroyo.

On this day in 2003, Cincinnati signed Todd Van Poppel.

On this day in 2007, the Reds traded Chris Denorfia to the Athletics for players to be named later, who ended up being Marcus McBeth and Ben Jukich. Despite struggling in Cincinnati, Denorfia has established himself as a good platoon player in San Diego.