Eugenio Suarez touches them all!

I was overeating today at Tank's Bar and Grill, when I saw this bomb by Eugenio Suarez of the Reds. He hit the ball pretty good, as Tony Perez used to say.

Geno provides the big blow for the #Reds Sunday. 💪https://t.co/GYN5XUprFX

— Cincinnati Reds (@Reds) May 15, 2016

In a rebuilding year...

...we will take this win today. Go, Reds!

RECAP: Suarez homer amid 5-run 4th inning boosts #Reds over Phillies. https://t.co/I0tQI59tdx pic.twitter.com/FEQmqLSKZM

— Cincinnati Reds (@Reds) May 15, 2016

Bob Howsam's Connection to the Broncos

I never knew this about the architect of the Big Red Machine, arguably the best team in National League history.

Sign Her Up!

This is fun! Good on Billy Hamilton.

The sadness of Pete Rose

Paul Daugherty has long been one of my favorite newspaper columnists, his specialty being sports. He writes for the Cincinnati Enquirer. Yesterday, Reds Country was abuzz with the announcement that Pete Rose, long banned from baseball and separately barred from the Baseball Hall of Fame in Cooperstown because he bet on baseball when he was a player and manager, would this year be inducted into the Reds Hall of Fame at Great American Ball Park and his number 14 forever retired from use by the Reds.

Daugherty registered what is probably a widespread point of view among Reds fans in a column titled 'Sadness pervades Reds' Rose announcement.' This is how it ended:

Enjoy the local honor [Daugherty writes to Rose]. It’s not a consolation prize, not for someone who grew up on the West Side and still, in some small way, owes his personality to that part of town. It’s not Cooperstown, either, or even a batting cage. Sadness endures, even on a day of celebration.

I responded:

I'm a lifelong Reds fan and Rose was, in Big Red Machine days, my favorite player. (In retrospect, I tilt toward Morgan as the best all-around and most pivotal contributor to the team's success though.)

People like Bonds and McGuire should never be allowed a spot in Cooperstown because, while baseball delayed taking a hard stand against PEDs, they and others juiced themselves in ways that made their on-field exploits artificial. They cheated.

But because baseball didn't finally promulgate stricter rules to banish such cheating from the game until after McGuire, Bonds, Sosa, and the others had done their worst, their ilk can't be banished from baseball as they should be.

Separately, they're still eligible for the Hall, though I doubt that they'll ever get in.

I am disappointed in teams that hire them.

But this has nothing to do with Pete Rose.

Despite repeated protestations to the contrary, given over a period of years, Rose did bet on baseball and on the Reds.

And, unlike the PED-users, there was no ambiguity about the rules governing betting in baseball. Since 1919, this has been a cardinal sin of the game. Rose knew it. Every player knew it.

So, while it may be sad that Rose isn't in baseball and may be disgusting that PED-users can stay in the game and even be eligible for Cooperstown, there's nothing to be done about it. Rose clearly violated the rules of the game, even flouted them.

The McGuires and Sosas of baseball violated decency but no official rules. While they shouldn't be allowed in the Hall, baseball can't block them from the game ex post facto, after the game finally cleaned itself of the filth of PEDs.

It had cleaned itself of gambling long before Pete Rose dirtied the game he loved and the career he cherished.

My sadness for Rose has nothing to do with thinking baseball is wronging him. It isn't. My sadness comes from realizing how, like the character in a Greek play, someone with so much greatness tossed his career and his greatness aside.

 

Goodbye, Johnny Beisbol?

The trade of pitcherJohnny Cueto from my beloved Cincinnati Reds seems inevitable. 

The ace's contract expires at the end of this season and he's such a great pitcher, any long-term contract will likely be out of the Reds' reach once he enters the free agent market. The trade deadline is the end of this month and I look for the Reds to seek to get something--1 solid major leaguer and two prospects seems likeliest to me--in a trade of Cueto before or shortly after the All Star Game.

I hate that it's come to this. The Reds have had a nucleus for pennant runs for several years now. Cueto as the ace of the pitching staff has been part of this nucleus. But it seems one thing or another has always gotten in the way of post-season contention: injuries, iffy middle relief, and so on. 

On top of that, Major League Baseball has been slow to adopt meaningful revenue sharing, such as exists in the NFL. The result is that the big-market teams with their big-market regional media contracts have deeper pockets and can outbid smaller-market teams like the Reds for the services of the Cuetos of the baseball world. 

I can't blame phenoms like Cueto for taking advantage of free agency, a hard-earned player right that, thanks to Curt Flood, freed players from what amounted to indentured servitude to baseball teams that paid them comparative pittances. But it surely would have been nice if the Reds could have, at some point during Cueto's tenure in Cincinnati, made a run for a pennant and beyond. 

Revenue sharing is essential for the competitiveness of major league baseball to be sustained and to cultivate deeper levels of loyalty from fan bases. Until that happens, the Reds and other small-market teams will routinely be bid out of contention for the established stars which their organizations may have developed but can't afford to keep.

By the way, vote for Cueto for the final fan-selected slot on the National League roster. His numbers commend him for the honor. There is no limit to how many votes you can cast. See here.

Ernie Banks Has Died

Ernie Banks, the great Chicago Cubs slugger, has died. It's impossible for baseball fans to talk about Banks without a smile: By all accounts, he was not just a Hall of Fame great, but a nice man.

So far as I know, Banks never gave out with any lamentations, but it's too bad that he played for the Cubs throughout his major league career and so, never got to the post-season.

Here are two interesting articles about Ernie Banks:

14 Remarkable Facts from Ernie Banks' Hall of Fame Career

Mr. Cub Ernie Banks dies at 83

What Moves Will the Reds Make This Off-Season?

Here are the latest hot stove reports, rumors, and speculations.

Quick: Who's the Best Fielding NL Second Baseman of All Time?

Baseball fans might be inclined to name people like Joe Morgan, Jackie Robinson, Rogers Hornsby, Ryne Sandberg, or Napoleon Lajoie in response to that question. All of them were great, both defensively and at the plate. Morgan and Robinson, at least, were also fantastic on the base paths, tremendous base-stealing threats.

But the best fielding National League second baseman of all time is playing the game in this era. It's Dat Dude, Brandon Phillips of the Cincinnati Reds.

According to the Elias Sports Bureau on Tuesday, Phillips has taken over the all-time lead in fielding percentage by NL second basemen at .990 from the previous leader, Ryne Sandberg. The Hall of Famer and former Cub had a .989 career fielding percentage...

Since joining the Reds in 2006, Phillips has played 1,307 games at second base. He has committed 65 errors in 6,195 total chances.

One of the slams some fans put on BP is that he's all flash and no substance in the field. Phillips is flashy. Astoundingly so. But he's also effective. No opposing batter wants to hit balls within thirty feet of him. He's almost always sure to record another spectacular out.

That makes his record all the more amazing. Phillips often gets to balls on which other second basemen would be unable or unwilling to make plays. In a sense, he puts his fielding percentage in greater jeopardy than most players would because of his aggressive play.

I'm looking forward to the 2015 season, in which a Phillips recovered from last year's thumb injury, dazzles us again with his amazing and effective--historically amazing and effective--play at second base playing for my Cincinnati Reds.

Glad that the Reds linked to this article by Mark Sheldon on Facebook and that I spied it during a break from studying and preparation this afternoon.

Giants Get Closer

They win again Sunday night to go up three games to two in the World Series.  Bumgarner was, again, amazing on the mound.

It's been a great series, which makes it all the more confounding to consider that its television ratings have been so low.

Oscar Taveras' Death

So sad. He was a player of promise.

39 Years Ago Today

Post by Cincinnati Reds.

38 Years Ago Today

The greatest team in National League history swept the Yankees to win the World Series. It was the second consecutive World Series championship for the Big Red Machine!

Ah, Kansas City!

Here. My son linked to this article on my Facebook timeline.

The year 1993, cited in the article as the point at which things went south for the Royals, due to the death of Mr. Kauffman and the ensuing "fire sale" of young talent, was when I saw my only game in Kansas City.

A colleague of mine and I were attending a church convention and a friend of his gave him two box seat tickets on the first base side. George Brett was in his last season and, as often happens for great players at the ends of the MLB careers, he was playing first base. 

I'm really happy for the Royals and for Kansas City, a town I've enjoyed whenever I've visited.

"When I went to the game, I got to play catch with Scott Downs"

"Sure you did. And Santa Claus was probably there too."

"No. REALLY!"


Very, very cool! Kudos to Downs!

The Post-Season Continues in the NL

Looks like neither the Cardinals or the Giants are going to run away with the National League crown and berth in the World Series. They're both digging in for what is proving an intriguing National League Championship Series (NLCS).

At this point, I'm pulling for another I-70 World Series, pitting the Kansas City Royals, already up two games to none over the Baltimore Orioles in the American League Championship Series (ALCS), against the Cardinals. The two teams met in 1985, winning the World Series four games to three.

Pulling for the Cardinals doesn't exactly set right with me. As a fan of the Cincinnati Reds, I view the Cards as kind of the death star of the National League's Central Division. I like the graphic my son posted on Facebook earlier this baseball season that carried the simple message, "Friends don't let friends root for the Cardinals."

But just as I would love to see an all-Ohio Reds versus Cleveland Indians (with a new team name, one would hope) World Series and just as a Mississippi State-Ole Miss college football championship sort of appeals to me (if Ohio State can't make the playoff), I'd like to see an all-Missouri World Series this year.

And even though I'm a dyed-in-the-wool National League fan, always rooting for the NL squad in the All Star Game and almost always pulling for the NL entrant in the World Series, I'd have to make an exception this year if the Royals win the AL crown. It would be a great feel-good story if they won the World Series after the franchise's twenty-nine year absence from post-season play.

Who are you rooting for?

It's the @Cardinals. They love drama. Hello, @KoltenWong: http://t.co/zK8sU2pUc3 #Walkoff pic.twitter.com/F8aBVt1Bez
— MLB (@MLB) October 13, 2014

Friday Was Bill Mazeroski's Birthday

Who is Bill Mazeroski?

He was the unlikely hero of the 1960 World Series. In the bottom of the ninth inning of the seventh and deciding game of the series, Maz, the Pittsburgh Pirates' capable second baseman, never known for his home run acumen, jacked one out over the left field fence to beat the New York Yankees.

It's the only time in baseball history that feat has been accomplished.

On Friday, Mazeroski turned 78. I'm sure that the man has led a rich and interesting life. But for many people, he will always be remembered for that one amazing moment at Forbes Field in 1960.

By the way, as I understand it, the only recording made of the entire game appeared on the MLB Network a few years ago. The recording had been made for singer/actor Bing Crosby, then a part-owner of the Pirates. Crosby, I've been told, was so nervous about the Series that he escaped to Europe to await news of the outcome. But he had someone record the Series. It was only years later that the recording was discovered somewhere in the late Crosby's archives.

If Bill Mazeroski happens to read this: Happy belated birthday, sir.

[Thanks to Howard Wilkinson for linking to this video over on Facebook.]