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Time for a recap of tonight’s titanic struggle….
FINAL
Cincinnati 3
Arizona 1
WP: Owings (3-3)
LP: Haren (3-4)
S: Cordero (10)
BOX SCORE
POSITIVES
–Five games over .500, and just one game out of first place!
–I can’t imagine Micah Owings has had very many nights better than this one. Not only did he dominate his former team, he beat their best starter, and he did it by tossing 7 innings, giving up one run on just four hits. Simply outstanding.
–Brandon Phillips continues to come back from his very poor April. BP had a couple more hits tonight, including his 6th homer, scoring two and driving in two.
–Jerry Hairston made two great plays off the bat of Chris Young, and Ramon Hernandez made a great play to end the game. Love to see the good defense.
NEGATIVES
–The only negative I can find is that Joey Votto was forced to leave the game in the bottom of the fourth inning with dizziness (no doubt related to his recent sickness). He’s day to day according to the Reds. I would be very surprised if Votto is in tomorrow’s lineup.
ETC.
–The bullpen made it exciting, but they got the job done.
–Not a bad outing for our fifth starter tonight, huh? Well, the Reds send their fourth starter to the mound tomorrow. Yeah, his name is Johnny Cueto, and he is 3-1 with a 1.59 ERA. Anyone else love to see a sweep?
–I think I’ve seen a Star Trek movie before, maybe even two of them, but it’s been fifteen or twenty years. Never watched any of the shows. But after seeing the latest movie tonight, I’m starting to wonder what I’ve been missing. It was excellent.
The Reds are rollin baby
just posted this in the game thread but thought it was worthy of posting here
I’m not 100% sure on these numbers but Coco recorded his 24th save in a row without blowing one as a Red
With tonight’s save he passes two great Reds closers.
John Franco who had 23 saves in a row 7/1988-9/1988 which is one of the most unhittable streaks ANY pitcher in baseball history has had. During Franco’s streak he had a 0.32 ERA and allowed only 14 hits in 28 1/3 IP.
and
Clay Carroll who also had 23 saves in a row 5/1972-8/1972
with his 24th consecutive save without a blown save Coco now sets his sight on the Reds record which is 26 by Rob Dibble.
In 1990-91 Dibble saved 26 in a row but also struck out 58 in 37 IP in one of the most dominant pitching streaks ever.
The NL record, of course is unreachable. Gagne saved 84 games in a row without blowing a save which spanned 3 seasons. No pitcher has come ANYWHERE NEAR that many. 2nd is Tom Gordon with 54 for Boston.
Hernandez looked great at 1B tonight. He made at least 1 great play and 3 very good plays.
I was shocked
the other thing I noticed tonight is how much range Bruce has in RF. He made at least two catches look easy but traveled a LONG ways.
this puts credence on a summary I read on FanGraphs that said through 31 games Bruce had been the most valuable defensive player in baseball. Think about this for a second.
Here are the numbers
The Reds have 3 players in the top 30 defensive list based on UZR. Can you name them?
http://www.fangraphs.com/leaders.aspx?pos=all&stats=fld&lg=all&qual=y&type=0&season=2009&month=0
Bruce was primarily a CFer in the minors, so the range doesn’t surprise me…it just took him a little while getting used to how the ball comes off the bat in a corner position.
It should also be noted that the only run “Micah allowed” was the batter he hit in the 8th inning. He plunked the first guy in the inning, Baker pulls him, and the bullpen allows the run to score. Owings was shutting them out through 7 full.
Great game. BP hit that HR about 17,000 feet. Then he put his head down and hustled it around the bases. I don’t need Rosales-type sprint, but you could tell that BP’s head is in the game, and he consciously told himself, “don’t stand and watch – run!”
I’ve always watched Star Trek passingly, and finally watched all the movies over the past month. Most of them weren’t very good. The new one was the best of them.
Being at work is easier when you have these kind of recaps to read. Loving it.
Great game by Micah, he did everything right.
BP has really been good lately.
Bp has been criticized pretty good around here (deservedly so, probably), so I want to recognize him for the good he does also. He was the main factor in all three runs last night. First, he hit the RBI single to score Hairston from third. Second, he aggressively went from first to third on Bruce’s hit right to the CFer, which allowed him to score on Hernandez’s sac fly. Third, hit a towering solo HR. All this while playing gold glove caliber defense. Like I said in a thread before the season started, he may not belong in the cleanup spot, but I sure am glad he’s on OUR team. Keep it going BP.
Although Owings didn’t hit last night, here is a nice article on his value as a hitter:
http://baseballanalysts.com/archives/2009/05/micah_owings_th.php
Bruce has been great in RF, but most of his value so far comes from his ridiculous 6 assists. He’s on pace to have about 30 assists. I doubt he keeps up that pace. But hopefully the pace falls off because people stop running on him, not because it’s a fluke.
Good call RCR… I may or may not have called Phillips being in the four-hole “negligent” last week. His place in the line-up nothwithstanding, he’s on one of his patented hot streaks and it’s great for the team. I’m glad to hear the reports of him hustling from those of you that get to see the games.
Change of subject… this has probably been noted one way or the other around here, but this little jewel comes from the end of the cincinnatireds.com article on last nights game:
“Through six starts, Owings is 4-3 with a 4.33 ERA. Last season, a collection of Reds’ fifth starters posted a 4-21 record.”
Matt, more importantly, the ERA of the #5 starter was something over 7….wins and losses isn’t much of a way to judge (see Arroyo, Bronson)..but I’ll take a 4.33 ERA out of my #5 starter. My question is, when are they going to quit calling Cueto the Reds #3 starter?
Personally, I’ve never understood the obsession w/ the terminology “#1 starter,” “#2 starter,” etc.
I suppose it can give you a way to classify how well someone is pitching, but basically at this point, it doesn’t matter who’s what. If they stay healthy, unless something changes, Arroyo, Cueto, Harang, Owings, and Volquez will all get somewhere between, say, 30 and 34 starts this year.
The only negative I saw last night was Bruce’s struggles against lefties. Pretty hapless. But yeah, his range is phenomenal.
The AZ broadcasters we’re making a huge deal out of Owings beaning Roberts after the two brushback pitches to Phillips, who overreacted big time. Mark Grace was SURE that there would be retaliation in the 9th. When that didn’t happen, he was SURE there would be payback tonite. What a bonehead.
I’m not sure Owings hit him on purpose. The ball came out of his hand funny.
BP did overreact, but that’s b/c he dives in, a little. And pitching him inside was appropriate – not because he watched that moonshot for 0.5 seconds, but because he has been killing the ball and they needed to “change his eye level.”
That said, this is the type of nonsense that often starts a minor beanball war.
Yes, I’d compare ERA of the #5 starters last year (over 7) to Owings this year (under 5). W-L record of the starters ignores the Reds 7-5 record in last year’s #5 starter no-decision starts.
Steve Nebraska continues to pull through for us. I still can’t get over the fact that there’s not a hole rended in our rotation when it’s time for number five to hurl that ball.
Oh, and he can hit as well.
From yesterday’s TSR (Titanic Struggle Recap) comments on the topic of options and the 40-man roster. Redblooded asked if anyone understood the 40-man roster situation:
I wrote:
Redblooded, If they are in the minors, then they’ve already used their player option for this year. Those players (already on the 40-man) can go up and down all year and it only “costs” the one option. Sutton (who was on the DL when Gonzalez was first hurt but is playing now) and Castillo are both infielders who are already on the 40-man roster.
RedBlooded wrote:
Greg, This is not quite the story. For instance you can only call up Homer Bailey once. He can not go up and down all year. If he struggles in the majors you can not send him back without exposing him to waivers.
Yes, Bailey can go up and down. Any player on the 40-man roster currently in the minor leagues has already used their option year. They can be called up and sent down all year on that option without being exposed to waivers. The only time they would be exposed to waivers is if the Reds attempted to remove a player from the 40-man roster.
I’m not sure what the situation is with all the players. I do know that once you call up Stubbs you start the clock since he has not ever been on ML roster. I don’t think you or anyone else wants to call up Sutton or Castillo. Everybody else that has been mentioned is not on the 40 man. So you have to kick someone off the 40 man when EE comes back.
Other players who are not on the 40-man roster, would require removing another player. Add Gomes? Have to remove McDonald. Most people would say that is not a problem, but to your point, it would be a problem when Gonzalez is activated from the 15-day DL. Someone has to get sent to the minors. Either a player with options (Dickerson or Rosales) or outright another player from the 40-man roster.
Castillo and Sutton aren’t optimal solutions, but they are better than playing with a 22-man roster.
I share Greg’s understanding of the 40 man and moving a player up and down such as the case with Bailey (or Rosales)… they can yank them up and down like a yo-yo if they want, at no extra “cost” as long as they stay on the 40 man.
Rob Neyer’s Transactions Primer
http://assets.espn.go.com/mlb/s/transanctionsprimer.html
Chris beat me to a citation… it attests to Greg’s assertion, with a few more specific circumstances.
This is one reason why it was crazy to start Alonso on the 40 man, it takes a spot away from someone is is ML-ready that we could use this year. I know that was a condition of him signing, but it really ties their hands.
I don’t think it “ties their hands” much at all.
Why? Because there is dead weight on the 40-man roster. so if the Reds want or need to make room it won’t be a big deal at all.
Hell. Would anyone even notice if McDonald was released? There is a spot right there
Hopper’s not on the 40 man roster, I’ve presumed putting him on it is not a problem if McD is released.
The “brushback” pitches were much ado about nothing. BP was leaning over the plate and overreacted. Micah meant to pitch the leadoff guy in the 8th tight but certainly not to hit him, that nearly ended up losing the game for us.
I’ve ranted on variantions of this before, but I’ll say it again: Good pitching and mediocre hitting will get you farther than mediocre pitching and good hitting.