A Year Too Early?

John Fay reported today that Dusty Baker and the Reds would discuss his contract status in early August.  This leaves me with some mixed emotions.  On the one hand, Baker has done a pretty good job this year, I think.  He's made some very good moves (like dropping Stubbs in the lineup and moving Phillips up), but also some not-so-good ones (like sticking with Orlando Cabrera and failing to get Chris Heisey in the lineup more).  Prior to the season, my big complaint about Baker was a fear that he would overwork the talented young pitchers that the Reds have.  He's done a good job there, seemingly having learned something from his past transgressions.  I suspect he'll get an extension, and I think it's probably a good move.

That said, this runs in contrast to how I saw the season playing out.  At the beginning of the season, I thought the Reds would need one more year before they could become a contender.  I felt the Reds needed this year to do the following things:

• Fire Dusty Baker,
• Move on from the fixation with Johnny Gomes and let Chris Heisey or Todd Frazier become the everyday LF,
• Trade Aaron Harang and Bronson Arroyo at the deadline for a few more quality prospects, and
• Get rid of Orlando Cabrera in anticipation of Zack Cozart being ready for 2011.

The Reds success this season has changed things a bit.  First, as I said, Dusty Baker has had a good year, so I'm cautiously optimistic that extending is a good thing.  It seems to me that we'd still be better off with Chris Heisey in LF than Johnny Gomes (although Todd Frazier isn't looking so hot right now).  Skipping the pitchers for a second, Orlando Cabrera has been a train wreck, and Cozart and Paul Janish ought to have a decent battle for the shortstop spot next spring. 

The pitching is the interesting item.  The Reds position as contenders would seem to make dealing Harang and/or Arroyo extremely unlikely despite the starting pitching depth that the team possesses.  Although I still suspect that the team would be better off in the long run dealing at least one of their "innings eaters", moving a prominent veteran player at the trade deadline suggests that the team is throwing in the towel on the season.  This tends to negatively impact both team and fan morale, and for a team in contention, the short-term win or two that could be lost may well be the difference between going to the playoffs or not. 

On the other hand, the Reds are a team currently constructed for the rigors of the regular season, not for playoff baseball.  They lack the top of the rotation starters that teams need to rely on in the postseason.  I've written plenty about them having plenty of pitching depth but little in the way of an ace, so I won't belabor that here.  The point is, in a short series, the Reds don't have the pitching to match up with a team like the Cardinals who can throw Carpenter and Wainwright at you for four games.  On top of that, the Reds don't seem to hit good pitching all that well.  Maybe that's just my perception, but the Reds have been shut out  a lot for a team among the best in the NL in hitting.  They've been shut down by Johan Santana, Cliff Lee, Felix Hernandez, Roy Halladay, and Cole Hamels (among others) over the last month or so.  That's the kind of pitching the Reds will face in the playoffs.

I'm loving the Reds resurgence this season.  I'm hoping that they catch lightning in a bottle and tear through the playoffs.  Deep in the back of my mind though, I'm wondering if exercising a bit of patience and grabbing a few more prospects at the deadline could ultimately lead to a greater number of playoff appearances in the coming years, and greater success once they get there.

Crowded in the Middle

I can't really recall a situation like the Reds face right now with their starting rotation.  In my mind, they've got ten decent starters, both for the remainder of this year and in future years, but none of those guys really stand out as top of the rotation kind of guys.  What should they do?  Let's look at what they've got to work with.  Several of the pitchers have some striking similarities, which, in my opinion, only makes it more difficult to figure out what to do.

The Veterans

Bronson Arroyo and Aaron Harang are the first guys to discuss.  They've been around the block, and we know pretty well what we're getting with them.  Both are free agents after this year, provided the Reds don't pick up their $13M options.  (Cot's Baseball Contracts has some nice salary information which helped me put this together.)  To this point, Arroyo has been worth 1.2 WAR and Harang 1.0 WAR this season, so they're not exactly living up to their current contracts at the moment.  Despite that, they continue to give the Reds more or less average production, as they have for several years.  They don't overpower guys; their stuff is basically average.  In fact, Arroyo's fastball only clocks in at 88.0, which is faster than only a dozen or so qualified starters in the majors.  Harang's is a more respectable, but still below average, 90.5.  

I've always thought of each of them as "innings-eaters", but after looking at the stats, I can see that's only really true of one of them.  Arroyo is working on a streak of five straight 200+ inning seasons and appears likely to get there this year as well.  In looking at the stats, I was surprised to find that Harang hasn't been so reliable these last few years.  Depending on how long his current back injury keeps him out, he could be looking at his third straight year of failing to hit 200 innings.  I tend to think that Harang is more likely to give you a big game, while Arroyo is more consistent and less likely to throw out a stinker.  The bottom line is, of all the guys on the staff, these two are the known quantities.  They're basically average pitchers who are going to give you six innings and keep you in the game more often than not.  Harang's inability to stay healthy at this stage of his career appears to make Arroyo the better bet going forward, both this year and in the future.  I think it is pretty safe to say that Harang's option will be declined next year.  I wouldn't be surprised to see the Reds try to bring Arroyo back on a two-year $16-18M contract or something like that.

Back on Top!

It was a great night for the Reds.  A commanding 10-3 win over the Indians coupled with a 4-2 loss for the Cardinals puts the Reds back in first place by a half game.  Aaron Harang didn't pitch the cleanest game, but he got through seven innings on just 108 pitches despite walking five and giving up two home runs.  Logan Ondrusek and Micah Owings each threw a clean inning of relief.  Offensively, the Reds were paced by Drew Stubbs with a homer and 4 RBIs.  Scott Rolen added a homer, and Joey Votto extended his reached base streak to a MLB season high 33 games by drawing two walks.  Besides Harang, Votto was the only Reds starter without a hit.

By itself, taking first place back from the Cardinals would be a big night, but it was a great night for nearly the whole organization.  In AAA, Louisville's Travis Wood shut out Norfolk 7-0, striking out 9 in eight efficient innings.  At the AA level, the Carolina Mudcats had a solid 11-4 win behind the hitting of Kris Negron (2 for 4 with a 2B, HR, BB and 4 RBI) and David Sappelt (a double short of the cycle) and a solid start from Tom Cochran.  (If there was one down-side to the night, it is that Brad Boxberger gave up 3 runs in one inning of relief in his AA debut.)  At high A Lynchburg, James Avery struck out 7 in five innings as Lynchburg beat Kinston 9-1.  Brodie Greene had 4 hits, and Josh Fellhauer added 3 for the Hillcats.  Then there's Dayton.  They lost to Lansing 7-6 in 11 innings.  I guess you can't win them all.  On the plus side, Cameron Satterwhite continued his torrid hitting with 3 doubles and Tim Crabbe threw five one-hit innings (although he did walk six).

After a rough first half of the season for the Reds minor league teams - all four top teams were in last place in their respective divisions when Dayton and Lynchburg went to their All-Star breaks - it is good to turn the page and look ahead to the second half of the season.  Louisville has a 10 game deficit to make up on Columbus for the division and a 7 game deficit to Scranton for the wild card.  Unlike the other three minor league teams, they don't get to start with a clean slate for the second half.  Hopefully Carolina, Lynchburg, and Dayton will take advantage of this opportunity and put together a strong showing in the second half.  There is a lot of talent in the system.  They've just got to convert that into wins.  Tonight was a step forward for the organization.

Recap of Reds-Nationals at Nationals Park on June 4

I'm posting this very late because of some computer problems, but I actually got to see the Reds play last Friday night.  (You'll also have to forgive me if some of the details were a bit blurry.)  The Reds were in town to play the Nationals in their only trip to DC this year.  (I hate the unbalanced schedule!)  The Nationals won 4-2, but I was long gone by then.  Five-year-olds can only take so much.

The pitching matchup for the night featured Aaron Harang and Livan Hernandez.  In the sabermetric community, Livan has been the poster-child for luck this season, and on this night, he was only OK.  Of course, Harang was much less than that.  He was just awful, despite allowing only two runs.  In the second inning, with 2 out, Harang walked Hernandez in what I recall was just an atrocious at bat for Harang.  Christian Guzman made Harang pay when he followed with a single, plating Ian Desmond from second.  Walking the pitcher is just inexcusable.  For what it's worth, Harang learned his lesson.  The next time Hernandez was up - leading off the fourth - Harang threw him a meatball that Hernandez promptly hit right back up the middle for a single.  I'd have felt a lot better about the run scoring in the second had it been because Hernandez got a hit, instead of giving him a walk.

If I recall, Harang had thrown an astonishing 80 pitches in just 3 innings when he came to bat in the fourth.  He was so bad that my uncle and I had a very serious discussion about whether the Reds should pinch hit for Harang at that point.  The discussion lost some of its luster when Ramon Hernandez, hitting in front of Harang, killed a great scoring opportunity by grounding into a double play.  With two out and Johnny Gomes on third, Harang hit for himself.  He got through the fourth inning and finished the night with 98 pitches in only 4 innings, yet exiting with the score tied at 2 (after the Reds scored to tie it up in the top of the fifth).  His stat line just did not do justice to how bad he was.

On the other side, Livan Hernandez was solid, but not spectacular by any stretch of the imagination.  He threw nothing but junk, but the powerful Reds offense really struggled against it.  I saw him hit 87 on the ballpark gun one time (as he struck out Jay Bruce to end the third, if I recall correctly), but I saw him drop down as low as 61 with a stunning array of absolutely nothing.  For six innings, it worked like a charm.  He got ground balls when he needed them.  He allowed just a single extra base hit (a double to Gomes).  It felt like he was stranding runners all night long.

All in all, it was hard to watch.  Especially for a certain five-year-old I know.

Ultimately, it wasn't a