Should Baker Bat Phillips Cleanup?

SI.com discusses the situation here.

Predicted Rotation

Here is my new projected rotation based on what I have read:

1. Harang
2. Arroyo
3. Cueto
4. Fogg (May be the 4 or 5)
5. Volquez (May be the 4 or 5)


Agree? Disagree?

Bailey to Louisville?

By Hal McCoy | Saturday, March 15, 2008, 01:16 PM

It was probably the biggest start of Homer Bailey’s spring, but there are indications that the decision about his immediate future already has been made.

Is is Loo-ee-ville or Lew-vull or Loo-iss-ville?

Ever how you pronounce it, Bailey is probably headed there to open the season, especially with the emergence of Johnny Cueto, Edison Volques and with the five scoreless innings Josh Fogg pitched Friday in Bradenton against the Pittsburgh Pirates - although my Aunt Fanny probably could shut down the Pirates.

Nevertheless, somebody deeply imbedded in the Reds system told me Bailey’s destination is Louisville, “Where he can get some innings, work on the command of his breaking pitches and adjust his attitude.”

Bailey isn’t really a bad guy. Just different. Stubborn? Yes.

Before Saturday’s assignment, Bailey was by himself in the clubhouse, dressed in civvies, stretched out on his back on a rubber mat on the floor. His teammates were taking batting practice before facing the Boston Red Sox and Bailey wasn’t required to be out there.

I was in there with him, just the two of us, and he was smiling and affable.

Asked about why he sometimes is short and terse with the media, he said, “I don’t like questions. It is perception. What a writer or somebody else might perceive, I perceive differently, and somebody else might perceive differently.”

Bailey, the 21-year-old No. 1 draft pick in 2004, permanently tattooed with Can’t Miss ink, was ready with an example.

“Some people might say Homer Bailey is struggling this spring,” he said. “But I’ve pitched against the Boston Red Sox and New York Yankees and now the Red Sox again, all at their places where I face their best players.”

Bailey quickly added, “I’m not complaining. That’ll help me if I’m with the team this season because we play both those teams (interleague). If I make mistakes to their big hitters, I’ll know what not to throw them when I face them in the season.”

Bailey then went out and gave up a leadoff double in the first to Julio Lugo and walked Kevin Youkilis on a full count. Bailey bowed his back and struck out both David “Big Papi” Ortiz (blew a fastball past him) and Manny Ramirez (called third on a breaking pitch).

But with two outs, MIke Lowell blooped a run-scoring single to left and Jason Varitek shot a run-scoring single to right for a 2-0 Red Sox lead. With one out in the second, he gave up a home run to the No. 9 hitter, Brnadon Moss, the not only cleared the center field wall, it cleared the 30-foot black batter’s eye behind the wall.

It continued in the third when Bailey gave up another run, ignited by a leadoff double by Ortiz. Two more runs scored in the fourth, with Bailey leaving with one out and two on in the fourth, both runners scoring and charged to Bailey when Tom Shearn gave up a two-run double to Youkilis.

For the day, Bailey gave up six runs and seven hits in 3 1/3 innings with twol walks and three strikesout, using 76 pitches to get only 46 strkes. And it’s Bye-Bye Bailey.

Bailey needed 30 pitches for the first inning and it looks as if he is Louisville-bound to get command and discover the world of pitch efficiency.

Seems to be to be the correct decision, based on what I’ve seen, but only if Jeremy Affeldt and Matt Belisle get it together, plus Cueto and Volques continfue to dazzle and Fogg keeps it going. The option are sinking.

Agree?

Personal aside: My son, Brent McCoy, visiting me this week with his wife, Tammy, caught a foul ball hit behind first base by Kevin Youkilis and did himself proud by giving the ball to a young fan.

Rotation reaches key turning point

Reds notebook: Shape could come into focus this weekend
BY JOHN FAY | JFAY@ENQUIRER.COM

SARASOTA, Fla. - Saturday through Monday, the Reds will get a glimpse at the rotation of the future - maybe the immediate future.

Homer Bailey will start Saturday against the Boston Red Sox in Fort Myers, Edinson Volquez will start against the Philadelphia Phillies Sunday at home and Johnny Cueto will start against the Detroit Tigers at home Monday.

To clear the way for Volquez and Cueto, Aaron Harang and Bronson Arroyo will start in minor-league games.

"Harang and Arroyo don't mind," Reds manager Dusty Baker said. "They're just getting their work in."

Bailey, Cueto and Volquez are competing for spots in the rotation.

The Reds are a little more than two weeks from breaking camp, and the rotation is largely unsettled.

"There's some definites," Baker said. "There's still quite a bit penciled in. I'm always counting on a kid to have a surprise spring.

"There are a few things that are fading - things that you thought were in pen."

Baker was talking about the team in general when he said that, but he could have been talking about the rotation specifically.

Harang and Arroyo are the definites, and Matt Belisle is penciled in. Cueto is the kid who has surprised.

Veteran right-hander Josh Fogg and left-hander Jeremy Affeldt, once penciled into the rotation, might not end up there.

Cueto and Volquez have wowed people at camp with their stuff. Cueto's results have been equally impressive - nine innings, one run, six hits, one walk and eight strikeouts - and he would seem to be a near lock to make the rotation.

But as Baker likes to say: "Spring training ain't over."

That's why this weekend is big for Bailey, Cueto and Volquez.

ROSS GETTING CLOSE: David Ross, who hasn't played since suffering back spasms in the intrasquad game Feb. 27, caught a bullpen session Wednesday.

"It went well, hardly any pain," he said. "I was pleasantly surprised."

Ross is hoping to be cleared to hit today.

HIGH-FIVE HISTORY: Baker is credited in some circles with being the first player to use the "high five" in baseball, in 1977.

"That's what they say," Baker said. "I don't give myself credit for it. Glenn Burke gave it to me, and I gave it back to him. So Glenn started it.

"Magic (Johnson) told me one day it was him. I said, 'Magic, you must have been about 8.' "

Baker prefers the "fist" now.

"I tell you one thing: Whoever invented the fist, that's the best," he said. "To me, that's the most sanitary way to shake hands. I use the fist in crowds. That's ingenious, because if you're going to catch something off the back of your hand, you're supposed to catch it anyway."

BAKER ON BRAY: Baker was impressed with left-hander Bill Bray's first outing of the spring.

Bray (shoulder) worked one inning, allowing a hit and striking out one.

"He threw strikes," Baker said. "I anticipated he'd be hard to pick up because of his delivery. I wish he could have faced a lefty, just to see the look from a lefty.

"But he threw strikes his first time out. That's huge."

Reds Have 4th Best Farm System

Pretty impressive Wayne. Read about it here.

Reds news from Goodyear

Source: C Trent Rosencrans

GOODYEAR, AZ – The city of Goodyear has found a way to fund the estimated $33 million cost of bringing the Cincinnati Reds’ Spring Training operation to its new ballpark, and is moving forward with negotiations with the team.
“We have met the terms of the Exclusivity Agreement with the Reds,” said Interim City Manager Brian Dalke. “The funding sources have been identified. However, in keeping with the terms of our agreement with the Reds, that information will remain confidential while we move forward with negotiations.”
The announcement comes a day before the March 13 deadline for identifying funding, set out in the Exclusivity Agreement signed on Jan. 28 by Goodyear and the Reds.
“The Reds organization is extremely pleased with the financing plan that the city of Goodyear has presented to us,” said John Allen on behalf of the Reds. “We look forward to continuing our discussions and will hopefully complete the agreement in early April.”
If negotiations with the Reds are successful, the team would begin training in Goodyear in 2010. The Reds would join the Cleveland Indians and become Goodyear’s second Ohio-based spring training ball club. The Indians will move their training facilities to Goodyear in time for the 2009 spring training season.

TODAY'S ACQUISITION:

Today the Reds claimed off waivers from the Giants 21-year-old LHP Jose Capellan...he was selected by SF from the Red Sox in December's Rule 5 Draft...Capellan in 4 professional seasons is 13-8-3, 2.74 in 29 starts and 21 relief apps (207ip, 169h, 49bb, 217k, 5hr).

Cueto the Reds’ ace? (And other information)

By Hal McCoy | Wednesday, March 12, 2008, 03:44 PM

This one stunned even me — because I’ve been covering this team for 36 years and I don’t think I’ve ever heard anything this strong from a scout.

A scout who once pitched successfully in the major leagues and whose opinion I trust implicitly, has seen young Johnny Cueto pitch every time he has pitched this spring. BEFORE Cueto’s appearance Wednesday night against the Phillies this scout said:

“Cueto is that team’s ace. Right now.”

Yikes. Pretty strong stuff, huh?

Then Cueto pitched the last four innings of a 6-1 win over the Phillies, and even when he is less than glamorous he is pretty cute.

With a new shaved head, Cueto hit the first batter he faced and gave up a bloop single to the second hitter he faced. Then he got a double play and a pop-up.

Then he pitched a 1-2-3 inning with two punchouts and when his night was over his line was: 4 innings, 0 runs, 1 hit, 1 walk, 1 hit batsman, two strikeouts. And this didn’t come against a Phill-in Phillies team. It was the big boys — Ryan Howard, Pat Burrell, Chase Utley, Jimmy Rollins, Geoff Jenkins — everybody but Richie Allen and Richie Ashburn.

The kid has style and pizz-zazz and is confident enough in himself to shave off his straggly hair when he was doing good and risking a dose of bad luck from the Superstitious Gods.

“He ain’t Samson,” said manager Dusty Baker. You could have fooled the Phillies, who took some swings that looked like Delilah twirling a broom. He threw 49 pitches, 33 for strikes.

Other good news:

Bill Bray made his first spring appearance and the left-handed relief pitcher went one inning, giving up one hit. But he needed only 13 pitches, throwing 10 strikes, to get through it.

“I just wanted to accomplish two things: no pain and throw strikes.” He couldn’t have done it much better.

Then there were the two late signees, refugees from Baker’s old Chicago Cub teams. Outfielder Corey Patterson played center field and Jerry Hairston Jr. played second base, 10 days after signing minor-league contracts.

Patterson beat infield hits his first two times up and Hairston crashed a home run his first time up.

It was a night to light up Baker’s eyes.

OFF TO THE DESERT

The Cincinnati Reds took another step forward toward sticking their feet into the Arizona desert sand Wednesday when the City of Goodyear met the deadline for coming up with funding.

Goodyear, Ariz., had until Thursday to prove to the Reds that it could come up with the financing — $33 million — for the Reds to move to their fair city/burg/town for spring training, joining the Cleveland Indians to share the facility.

Where the money is coming from was not revealed, but Goodyear assured the Reds that the money is available, and now city council must approve the deal April 7, believed to be a rubber-stamp affair.

“It is not a done deal, but it is another positive step and now we march on in the process,” said Reds negotiator John Allen. “We still have a few i’s to dot and t’s to cross.”

Now that money is not an issue, negotiations continue as to just what the Reds are getting as a co-tenant with the Cleveland Indians in the new $75 million stadium.

“We have to make sure we are getting the same thing in our MOU (memorandum of understanding) as the Indians are getting,” said Allen, explaining that an MOU is akin to a lease.

Meanwhile, Sarasota is trying to fix the toilets in Ed Smith Stadium.

EARLY CUTS

Nothing sent shock waves through the premises this afternoon when the Reds trimmed their spring training squad.

Left-handed pitcher Alexander Smit was optioned outright to Class A Sarasota. Right-handed pitchers Richie Gardner and Tyler Pelland were optioned to Class AAA Louisville, while catcher Chris Koski, left-handed pitcher Matt Maloney and left-handed pitcher Adam Pettyjohn were reassigned to minor-league camp.

The spring roster is at 57 and expected to dwindle fast.

McCoy Picks His 25... What are yours?

Here is what Hal McCoy says would be his 25 players to go north with the team:

STARTING PITCHERS: Aaron Harang, Bronson Arroyo, Johnny Cueto, Homer Bailey, Matt Belisle.

BULLPEN: Francisco Cordero (closer), David Weathers, Edinson Volquez, Jeremy Affeldt, Jared Burton, Kent Mercker, Todd Coffey.

CATCHERS: Paul Bako, Javier Valentin.

INFIELDERS: Joey Votto, Scott Hatteberg, Brandon Phillips, Edwin Encarnacion, Jeff Keppinger.

OUTFIELDERS: Ken Griffey Jr., Adam Dunn, Jay Bruce, Norris Hopper, Corey Patterson.

INFIELDER-OUTFIELDER: Ryan Freel.

DISABLED LIST: Pitcher Bill Bray, pitcher Bobby Livingston, catcher David Ross, shortstop Alex Gonzalez, infielder Juan Castro.


What are your 25?

Freel to be dealt?

Hal McCoy thinks it could be a possibility. Read it here.

Good Article By Doc About Dusty

Read it here.

FAN SUBMISSION

COREY PATTERSON – SUBTRACTION BY ADDITION?

By Petey Hendrix, LetsTalkReds Article Submitter

The Reds have minor league player of the year Jay Bruce, and he’s looking good enough to start in the majors immediately.

Dusty Baker, the new Reds manager, used his pull to bring in one of his former players, Corey Patterson, as another live body on a team temporarily low on healthy position players. Dusty says that this is to add more competition to the mix, not to replace Bruce in the lineup, which strikes me as the kind of lie you tell your kid to get him to go to sleep. You know, like “If you don’t go to bed now, Don Zimmer will kill the tooth fairy.”

Bruce already had veteran competition in Norris Hopper and Ryan Freel, so don’t believe that competition garbage for a moment. Is the truth that Corey and Dusty get along great, so Dusty was all too happy to reach for the jar of FAMILIAR MEDIOCRITY that was on the shelf, because the jars of QUALIFIED and EXPLOSIVE POTENTIAL just seemed less comfortable to a guy who is new to the organization? Folks, that certainly reeks of making personnel decisions by ignorance, not by what is best for the franchise.

Dusty thinks that Corey might be lightning in a bottle. I think Corey might be less electric than a Hello Kitty keychain flashlight.

My conclusion is based on statistics, Dusty’s opinion is based on observation. I think Dusty’s wrong.

Perhaps Dusty is like all of us humans, easily falling victim to observational memory flaws. Why People Believe Weird Things: Pseudoscience, Superstition, and Other Confusions of Our Time by Michael Shermer details how we all have a tendency to remember incidents based on how much they stand out from the norm, rather than remembering them with a wider, more valid context. There are two really good baseball examples of this:

First, there’s the tendency of devout fans of any team to think that their shortstop is either excellent or horrible defensively, but rarely anywhere in between. This is because routine grounders are unremarkable, and therefore tend not to lodge themselves as weightily in our minds as a spectacular play or a mind-boggling blunder. We tend to far more easily recall the spectacularly good or spectacularly bad than the routine, and we make mental-and gut-based evaluations based on these conclusions. If your shortstop is at least average and you see him play 100-some games each year, you’ll likely remember far more clearly the spectacular 40-60 plays he made, forgetting both the 25-30 plays he screwed up and the 500 routine plays as well.

Also, there’s the old adage in baseball that to this day mesmerizes Marty Brennaman: that whichever player just got done making a spectacular defensive play to end the inning will invariably lead off the next inning. You don’t have to be a mathematician to figure out that the odds of any player in the field leading off the next inning are 1 in 9. This adage is often stretched to include the on-deck batter, often featured putting on his helmet when the TV broadcast returns from commercial break while he nears the on-deck circle. Well, there is a 22% chance that any player in the field will be one of the first 2 hitters in the next inning. You can see where you’d notice this spectacularly when it did happen, and you wouldn’t even think of it when it DOESN’T happen. Ah, how our minds bend our observations!

Let’s not lose sight in this discussion, however, that we’re not likely “smarter” than Dusty for seeing things our way. We are relatively obsessive fans who read blogs and statistical analysis about our teams, and since essentially none of us have on-field experience of seeing these guys in competition daily, it’s easy for us to discount Dusty’s observational evaluations as statistically invalid. I’m sure the opposite is true, that Dusty thinks statheads aren’t as valid in their conclusions as “baseball men”. I haven’t heard of Dusty getting Sabermetric briefings ever, and he has yet to invite me to watch batting practice. He likes single malt scotch, and I’m a girlie drink drunk. We also have different underwear sizes, but that doesn’t make either of us “right”.

I think my evaluations would be helped by the experience that Dusty has. I think that statistical analysis would help Dusty, but you’d be hard pressed to prove that it would help him. It pains me to admit it, but on this point, advantage Dusty, waist 42.

So is Dusty, who has had tons of MLB success, seeing something we’re not? To figure that out, let’s take a look at Corey from a statistical perspective first.

First of all, Corey is a good basestealer, but is not a power hitter. In only one season has he topped 16 HR plateau. He’s far from being a “doubles machine”, only topping the 20 2B mark once in the last 3 years. So he has to fit in as a table setter / leadoff hitter type if he is to be considered an offensive commodity.

Before he stuck in the majors in 2002, he had a career minor league OBP of .332, meaning he reached base safely in roughly 1 out of 3 times. For a leadoff hitter, that’s bad. In the majors, he’s had a career OBP of .298, and has never topped .329. If you’re a leadoff hitter and/or speedster and add walks to your batting average to calculate OBP, you’d better come up with an OBP better than .298.

But last year Corey exceeded his career OBP with what the Reds scouts are touting as an improved approach at the plate in the second half of 2007. That improvement led him to a OBP of .304 for 2007.

Is that a pretty good OBP? Nope. It’s lousy.

In fact, that OBP for Corey last year ranks him as #148 in the majors. In fact, when it comes to “setting the table” by getting on base, Corey’s “improved” year was worse than that of Felipe Lopez (.308), and barely better than the disastrous year Jason Kendall had (.301). If you think Jason Kendall would make a good leadoff hitter for the Reds, please hurry out and become GM for one of the Reds’ division rivals. Kendall reached base last year so seldom that I’d be surprised if the first base coach never even learned his name.

But let’s temper this with a look at Corey’s second half improvements, even though a half-season is not much of a statistical model from which you might generate viable conclusions.

John Fay of the Cincinnati Enquirer wrote:

“Patterson is a .258 hitter with a .298 on-base percentage for his career, but the Reds liked what they saw from him late last year. He hit .313 with a .333 on-base percentage in the second half of last season with Baltimore and struck out only 21 times in 201 at-bats.”

I was quick to discount this improvement until I saw the low strikeout numbers. And apparently he hadn’t even bunted once in the majors prior to Dusty taking the reigns in Chicago, but now is a qualified bunter. That’s improvement that’s worth a minor league contract during spring training.

I doubt Corey will help the Reds this year. In fact, he might well stunt the growth of Jay Bruce. But since he’s cheap and the Reds are short enough on healthy infield bodies that the IF/OF guys like Keppinger, Gil, Votto and Freel are getting their AB’s somewhere, I can wait this one out to see if Corey can offensively explode. But despite being a first-round draft pick, I don’t see breakout potential here. And barring breakout potential, 28-year-old journeymen shouldn’t get in the way of the franchise.

It’s up to Dusty and Krivsky to ensure that doesn’t happen. Stay tuned.