Isn’t it amazing? We’ve actually had Reds news the last couple days. It’s not exactly the most exciting stuff in the world. But… news!

This picture has been out for awhile, but I think Chapman kinda looks like he’s doing duck-face.

• The Reds have  their promotional schedule for 2013 out, and Red Reporter has all the highlights for you. Bobbleheads this year are: Votto, Phillips, Frazier, Latos, and Chapman. I’m still waiting for the Brandon Phillips Bowling Ball giveaway. Surely there’s nothing impractical about that.

• Two Reds have come to one-year deals with the team, avoiding arbitration. Chris Heisey is in with essentially a standard midpoint deal (Heisey: 1.6, Team: 1.05, Deal: 1.325). Alfredo Simon and the team also settled, but the number hasn’t been released yet. At “somewhere between $750,000 and $1,050,000″, I’m not that concerned.

• MLB.com released their top 100 prospects going into 2013, with Rangers shorstop Jurickson Profar taking the number one spot this year. Reds prospects on the list include #11 Billy Hamilton (#3 OF prospect), #51 Robert Stephenson, #66 Tony Cingrani (#6 LHP). Former Red Didi Gregorius also made the list (#63), now in the Diamondbacks system.

• Jamie Ramsey posted the broadcast schedule for Reds spring training. Only 1 game will be televised on FSN Ohio, but most games will be on the Radio, and a handful will be on audio-streamed on Reds.com. Of course, there may also be a couple of games televised by the opponent’s network, which might get picked up by MLB Network. Maybe.

• And apparently Rolen does want to come back? But they haven’t worked out a deal yet. Fay interprets it as a money issue. I have nothing but respect for Rolen, but I don’t think it makes sense for us at this point. As Fay points out, there’s not a lot of money left in the banana stand, and I think the pieces we already have are going to be more useful.

I told you it wasn’t very exciting. Thankfully, there’s less than two weeks until pitchers and catchers report, so we’ll be able to overreact to the trickle of standardized quotes that players give in spring training. Hooray!

(Photo by Keith Allison/Flickr)

Or, “The Search For Frazier’s Playing Time”

Today marked the first day of Joey Votto’s return to the Reds lineup. It was like Christmas, Chanukkah, Festivus, and Ramadan all rolled into one. As expected, he was fantastic, though the outcome of the game was not so great. A lot of angst has been put into the the fate of Todd Frazier, with good reason. Since Votto’s injury, Frazier has slotted in most often at first base, while Rolen has gone back to manning third almost full time.

Both before and after the injury, Frazier has been excellent, which has been highlighted by the fact that his playing time nearly doubled after the Votto Injury Watershed. Here’s a look at the offense, before and after 7/15, which was the last game (before today) that Joey Votto appeared in.

That really highlights how important Todd Frazier become to the Reds, as the player with the most plate appearances, after Joey went on the DL.  Unfortunately, the numbers demonstrate how difficult it’s going to be to get Frazier on the lineup as much he deserves in the next month. Thought Frazier started in the Reds system as a shortstop, right now, it looks like he can essentially be trusted to play first, third, and maybe a little left field. However, we’ve got Mr. MVP back at first base now, and both Rolen(.894) and Ludwick (1.051)  have hit very well with Joey out.

Obviously, I think that Frazier should take on more of the starts at third base. We won’t get much improvement over the last 30 games from that, as Rolen has hit so well in Joey’s absence – but it will probably be beneficial going forward, as Rolen may be wearing down at the end of the season. (Though I’m pretty confident that Dusty won’t sit Rolen as often as I would. Meh, c’est la vie.) Slotting Frazier in at first is probably also a good idea, as Joey certainly doesn’t need to be playing seven games a week, straight from coming off injury.  It’s tempting to throw Frazier into left – but 1) Ludwick is hitting well, and 2) considering defense, Heisey is probably the better sub.

It’s frustrating that we can’t shift Frazier to take on some of the weaker spots in the lineup, but unless he’s learned to catch, or play center field, our options may be limited. It’s also a shame to think that the return of Votto is only going to provide marginal improvement to our offense. I mean, Joey is the god-king-emperor of all creation and all, but his return would be more dramatic if Votto was going to essentially replace 5 Miguel Cairo plate appearances every game.

Time for the update of the C-ing Red… something something, whatever I called that hotness index originally. Again, all caveats apply, but it’s actually holding my interest, so I figured I’d go ahead and share. Pretty much every is just cold right now. Votto and Heisey are hitting well, comparatively; Hanigan, Phillips, and Rolen are maintaining. Everyone else, is sucking a bit, hence the excessive amount of blue on the right side of the blog.

Votto though, is something else. A minor amount of comment has been made about Joey Votto’s slight lack of HRs, which was of course, more than made up for by his OBP and doubles power, and secondly, somewhat remedied by Sunday’s stellar performance. But Joey Votto’s name has come up in bright red nearly every-time I look at who’s hot right now.

Take a look at this graph of Joey Votto’s OPS over the course of this season.

Outside of the very small sample sizes at the beginning, and maybe like, one down week in mid-April. Mr. Votto has been on the up and up for the whole last three weeks, which is pretty awesome. Of course, this last jump is based on one phenomenal game, so even if Joey OPS’s 1.000 for the next month, that’s still technically a drop, but that just shows you how good Joey’s been thus far.

Also note that even though the offense has been pretty cold, we’ve won 3 out of the 5 games that the index covers, so it just goes to show, that a couple hot hitters, solid pitching, and a little luck can go a long way.

As far as turning things around tonight, Tim Hudson has looked vulnerable this year, but that’s only in 3 starts. He still boasts a pretty respectable ground ball rate, and for some reason, no current Red has been particularly good against him. Somewhat oddly, this will be the third time that Cueto faces off against Hudson – I noticed that with 4 PA against Hudson, Cueto has the sixth most PA against Hudson among all active Reds. Weird.

Photo by Wknight94 at wikimedia commons)

This is not a masterful win for the Reds, but it’s a win. I think Homer Bailey’s put up a couple of starts now that feel like this. He wasn’t great, but he got great results, at least in the box score. 6 2/3 innings with only 1 run scored is pretty great, right? But it took him a lot of pitches, and he didn’t strike out very many guys. He also had just 7 ground outs to 8 fly outs. Some of them were bizarrely hard hit pop ups, but I think it does mean he may have gotten a little bit lucky.

It was also another great performance for the bullpen, who kept the Reds ahead, even in a close game. 4 base-runners in 2 1/3 innings still isn’t the most dominant performance – it felt like the Braves were almost in it once or twice, but you can’t complain about what they’ve been doing this year.

Offensively speaking, the Reds were back to their low-scoring ways after last night’s Joey Votto fueled run explosion. Heisey broke his trend of being not-so-good when not-so-pinch-hitting by starting and going 3-3 with two doubles. Everyone else? Less good. But we won! And considering tomorrow night’s game is Johnny Cueto versus Tim Hudson, I feel mildly optimistic of our chances of winning this “series”.

IT'S SPRING, OH THANK GOD IT'S SPRING. (Photo by me!)

It’s that time of year. Finally, finally, finally. Along with hope, happiness, sun, baseball, green grass, beauty, love, and all things good and holy in this world, the beginning of spring training always brings a certain kind of story. I love these stories, incidentally, and we have them in no small quantity this spring.

First, “the rebound”: 

When something goes wrong, the first thing we want to hear next year is that things are going to be better. Thus, we’re all veeeeeerry happy to hear that Cozart feels much better after his season ending ACL surgery. Plus, John Fay also tells us that Bronson “My life would suck less without GABP” Arroyo thinks his velocity is back. Now, while it’s easy to say that Bronson had a rough season last year, it’s hard to say whether it was a velocity issue, a mono issue, a back-pain issue, or a being baseball old issue. Or maybe a little of each. Or maybe some of them caused each other. In any case, at this point, we know two things: it’s good that Arroyo’s saying his velocity is back, and he’s going to say that at the beginning of spring training no matter what.

Next, “the early bird”:

Baseball players get half the year “off”, to make a lot of money, so even though it’s probably only minorly relevant, we really love to see them show up for Spring Training before they need to. Although Bruce appears to be the big-news position player already in camp, Ryan Ludwick, Todd Frazier, Chris Heisey, Juan Francisco, Paul Janish and Wilson Valdez are also already in Goodyear, AZ. If anyone’s counting, these are the guys who are looking to claim a bigger share of playing time out the gate, or maybe just avoid being sent to Louisville for the season, by trying to prove their dedication to the higher ups, or just get a head start. Or, in most of these cases, not fall behind the competition. At least I know if I’m Paul Janish, I don’t want to show up to camp a millisecond past Cozart and Valdez.

Last (for now) “best shape of his life”:

Although that exact phrase has become so used it’s a bit passe, and rare in literal interviews, there’s still always a guy who has decided to get in shape instead of chilling on the couch and watching a lot of M*A*S*H reruns. This year, it’s Mr. Jay Bruce, who, as has been previously referenced on this blog, has decided to slim down and muscle up. And how. Bruce says he only lost about 15 pounds, but considering this guy is listed at 6’3″, I’m guessing that’s minus fat, and plus muscle mass: and he wasn’t exactly fat, fat to begin with. And Homer Bailey’s put on about the same amount of weight. This is apparently something the Reds have asked him to do before. Hopefully he’s looking a little more Batman-Christian-Bale and a little less El-Machinista-Christian Bale. I mean, something about his shoulder injury. Yeah, uhhhh, that’s the important thing.

My fiance went to a lot of work to put this Reds hat on a goat. Appreciate the man, people.

The 2012 Reds are winners. We’re all extremely sure of that, right? Nothing can go wrong, and our team is going to awesome, it’s agreed. Also, all the other teams in the NL central are going to suck. It’s friggin’ destiny. I mean, we Reds fans haven’t suffered through a decade of crap, followed by a year of awesome, followed by another year of crap just to sit back and not win in 2012, am I right?

But I mean, in the 0.01% chance that we aren’t awesome next year, or say, even in the 60 games or so we’ll inevitably lose, we’re going to need one, or a few guys to shoulder the blame. I’ll take a look at some of the likeliest candidates and the strongest arguments for an against.

» Continue reading “Picking A 2012 Reds Scapegoat”

I wanted to find him not in a Cardinals uniforms, but this is actually worse, I think. Photo by SD Dirk

So, according to Ken Rosenthal, all those left field questions have been answered. That is, the Reds have signed Ryan Ludwick to a one year deal, with a mutual option for 2013. Ludwick is apparently guaranteed $2.5 million, with a possible $3 million total, including incentives. Ludwick also becomes the third Ryan, in addition to the potential all-Ryan battery of Hanigan and Madson. I don’t know what crazy possibilities this may lead to, because I haven’t read the new CBA, but I hear it’ll be ridiculous.

Now, Ludwick and Heisey are both right-handed batters, which may eliminate the platoon option depending on whether you (well, more importantly, whether Walt and Dusty) take Heisey’s major league reverse platoon splits seriously. Ludwick is also not exactly a spring chicken. He’s not Rolen yet, but he’s in the next tier of older Reds, as he’ll be 33 this season. He’s had reasonably consistent playing time since 2008, though he’s suffered a few nagging injuries throughout the years (like these back spasms of 2011, or this minor calf injury in 2010), notching at least 500 PA in the past 4 seasons.

2008 was Ludwick’s peak, pinnacle, and acme, as Ryan put up a nigh-MVP calibre season (you know, if there weren’t that other guy on the Cardinals who was pretty good), with an OPS of .960, and 37 HR. However, things have been on a steady decline for Ludwick since then, posting OPS’s of .775, .743, and .674. The biggest benefit that Ludwick has over Heisey is that he does seem to be a little better at taking a walk: they had about equivalent OBPs last year, but Heisey’s was more AVG related. But by no means does is Ludwick a clear improvement.

Of course, that’s not necessarily even the point. Ludwick’s presence provides at least a reasonably reliable fourth outfielder on the roster, even though it seems that Walt may be clinging to Ludwick’s success when they were both with the Cardinals.  But it doesn’t really matter who gets the playing time, as long as we’re not relying on an untested Denis Phipps when we come into the season. This is definitely my least favorite move of the off-season (I like Fukudome, and the C-ing Red Puppy favors, as we know, Cody Ross)  but it’ll do, Walt, it’ll do.

Metaphorically speaking, that is. Literally, it’s the first letter in “Collective Bargaining Agreement”, which is not that hard to find, honestly.

First of all, there’s a lot we still don’t know about the CBA, mostly it’s come through bits off twitter – and then funneled to me through mlbtraderumors. We’ll all get the final details on Tuesday when the agreement is announced.

The biggest issue for Cincinnati so far seems to be the change for free agent relievers (and for select position players – but we don’t know the details of that yet) - the signing team will no longer lose draft picks. That’s a big difference when it comes to CoCo. This makes it more favorable for another team to sign him. Actually, I guess this tends to increase the number of free agents switching teams – afterall, it’s much better for the Reds to sign an equivalent free agent to Cordero for the same amount of money than to sign with Cordero, because now we get draft picks. Now, imagine this happening everywhere around the league – sort of a proliferation of draft picks, which in turn, lessen the value of everyone’s draft picks. The actual consequences of this process might change a little, as the other big piece of news is that starting next season – Type A designation will no longer be determined by ELIAS rankings, but instead the value of “qualified offers”. And, of course, all we know for sure is that applies to relievers, and probably not to guys like Albert Pujols, so, of course, it could be a very small effect.

It’s also possible that this may affect Ramon Hernandez, the Reds’ other type A free agent, but it’s not for sure.

Another big issue is expanding the percentage of players with between two and three years of service time (and who have at least 86 days of service time in the last season) that qualify for super-two arbitration from 17% to 22%. So the number of super-twos next year will still depend on the number of players who make up the pool, but for instance, for this season, there were 19 super-two players, including our own Jose Arredondo, who ranged from having 2.171 years of service time (1 day short of three years) to 2.147 years. Under the new rule, 25 players would have qualified, total.  Right now the Reds have several players with between 2.147 and 1.000 years of service time.

• Drew Stubbs, 2.047
• Mike Leake, 2.000

These are already our definite arbs for next year.  Stubbs will probably have 3 or more years of service time after next season. Mike Leake is almost a lock to qualify either as a normal first year arb, or as a super two.

This guy knows what he's talking about

First, you start with Coors Field. A mile up in the atmosphere, the Rockies home field by itself is enough to turn a game into a home run party.  This evidently has to do with the low air density at that altitude, which, although I’ve taken physics, more physics, calculus based physics, and that kind of stuff, I’m not sure I totally understand. In any case. Fly balls fly further. Breaking balls break less. Humidor or not, the park factor for Coors is still 118. Yowzas.

Next, be sure to add Bronson Arroyo. The not-as-crafty-as-usual right hander, as we’ve covered before, has been a sure bet for homers this season. Tonight, he cranked it up to 40 on the season, which ties the Reds’ season record with the much loved Eric Milton, who wasn’t paid very much and was worth every penny. It also gets him close to the MLB top ten. (The record is 50). Of the three home runs allowed tonight, only one was to a proven slugger – although Jason Giambi has only 13 home runs on the season, he’s done it in 135 PA, which is pretty outstanding. Fowler and Ellis, who hit the other two home runs this evening, have combined to hit 11 total on the season. Of course, on the Reds pitching side, you can’t forget the lovely solo shot that Maloney allowed to Pacheco in the fifth. Oh, and then you’ve got the lackluster relief appearances by LeCure and Chapman, taking the blame for 2 runs each – which put the game firmly out of reach by the ninth – although no homers were involved in that scoring.

Oh, and then, you’ve got the Reds offensive side of the equation. Poor Alex White allowed 5 homers to the Reds tonight. One to an MVP, one to a respected power hitter, one to a prospect who is known almost solely for hitting homers, aaand two to Chris Heisey. That’s not to say Heisey can’t hit homers – he’s hit 15 this year in limited plate appearances, and hit 22 between AA and AAA in 2009. Alex White, on the other side of that equation, doesn’t have much of a track record of allowing home runs – but he doesn’t have much of a track record at all. Before tonight, he had allowed 7 in 32 innings. Don’t get me wrong, that’s pretty terrible, and only six of those innings and two of the homers were in Coors. Still, the kid was a 1st round draft pick by the Indians in 2009, and has one full season in the minors. Hard to tell, but a game like this could shake anyone’s confidence. Chin up, Alex, your HR/9 for the game is only 1/3 of what Arroyo’s was.

Anyway, in this case it resulted in 9 homers between the two teams. The record, incidentally, is 11 home runs between two teams in a single game in the National League (it’s 12 in the AL/MLB). And in this case, although we won the home run game, it was a recipe for a Reds loss. Heisey, Votto, and about 1/2 of the Reds pitching staff really did an excellent job of trying to put this one in the win column. Unfortunately, the Rockies did excellent-er.

I hope not.

In any case, I know that these stats have probably been up for awhile, but I thought I’d take a look at what the vaguely new-ish situational hitting statistics on BB-ref. These stats are really great to look at, although not always particularly useful, but they’re sortable by both team, and by player, which makes for interesting trivia, available at the click of a button.

The Reds this year have had some interesting issues. Many have complained about the Left-On-Base issue, and many more have justly noted that LOBs are usually more about having lots of guys get on base (good), than a chronic team-wide lack of clutchness (bad). It’s hard to argue that our real problem as a team is not driving runs in, when we’re second in the NL in runs scored. Thankfully, bb-ref has a baserunners-scored percentage – Cincinnati is also second in the league (second to the Cardinals, the number one NL offense), with 15% of “baserunners scoring on the batter’s play”, but only trailing by a few tenths of a percentage. In general, there is not a lot of variation between the top and bottom teams – ranging only from 13%-15%, but the top offenses in the league all have the best BRS%, while the worst offenses have the worst BRS%s.

The Reds are particularly good at scoring a man from third with less than two outs. We have had more chances than anyone else in the league – but also have the best scoring percentage – 57%. However, we’re less proficient at advancing a man on 2B with no outs – although we’re 3rd in the NL in those opportunities, we’re in the bottom half in percentage of those runners advanced.

Cincinnati really excels in the pinch-hitting area. Although we have the one of the fewest number of PH ABs in the league – we lead in both PH hits and PH RBIs.

Some notes on individual player situational hitting after the jump.

» Continue reading “If I write a blog post about situational hitting, is that guy from Jersey Shore going to show up?”