Cincinnati Reds links - GABP Opening Day Edition

Last year, we predicted that Nick Senzel would be a Gold Glove finalist.

This year, we predicted that Nick Senzel would be a Gold Glove finalist, doubling down on our belief that the former 2nd overall draftee by the Cincinnati Reds had some elite CF defense embedded within him.

As it turns out, Nick Senzel both reads and is inspired by the work at Red Reporter dot com. In talking with Mark Sheldon of MLB.com over the weekend, he confirmed that getting the little hyperlinked GG on the right side of his Baseball Reference player page is indeed a goal of his, and he has sure looked comfortable out there in the early goings in 2022.

In other news, the fine folks at RC+ took a closer look at the team rolling into GABP to help the Reds lift the lid on their home games this year - the Cleveland Guardians. That will include OF Steven Kwan, who enters play today having gone 9 for 13 with 5 BB, a HBP, and not a single K to start the season.

Over at FanGraphs, they finally got to the Cincinnati system in their rankings of the top prospects in each organization. All the usual suspects rank near the top, but they appear to be just a little bit higher on some of the arms acquired in this winter’s salary dumps than others, with each of Brandon Williamson, Chase Petty, and Connor Phillips featured prominently.

Speaking of FanGraphs and Cleveland’s Steven Kwan, friend of the blog Dan Szymborski (hi, Dan!) revealed his breakout candidates for both pitching and hitting over the last two days, and Kwan got a significant mention in the process. Sadly, the Cincinnati Reds have no Dan Breakouts listed, even though Nick Senzel is going to have a 20/20 season and win a Gold Glove.

Joey Votto is now on Twitter, and Joey Votto is now fantastic on Twitter.

Over at ESPN, Jesse Rogers has a deep dive about how the latest CBA didn’t adequately address the concept of teams tanking, and within it are numerous quotes from now former Reds. It’s an interesting read aside from the fact that, y’know, the Reds are one of the teams in the spotlight of said story on tanking.

Here’s Phil Castellini on radio being a complete jerk about the state of the Reds and their relationship with fed-up fans:

“Where ya gonna go?”

Good lord. This clip’s for you, Phil: