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Hall of Fame baseball writer Hal McCoy has retired from the Dayton Daily News after covering the Cincinnati Reds for 37 years. Hal's blog, though, will continue to be a must-read for Reds fans. He'll share his thoughts on the team this season and will file updates from Great American Ball Park. You also can catch Hal in print every Sunday in his popular Ask Hal columnHome > Blogs > The Real McCoy | Cincinnati Reds baseball news > Archives > 2008 > May > 28
Wednesday, May 28, 2008
The Big Home Machine wins again
Some thoughts after watching the The Big Home Machine win its ninth straight — and OK, so it’s the Pittsburgh Pirates. Remember, though, the Pirates swept the Reds at PNC in early April.
And the Reds did beat the Marlins and Indians six straight on the previous homestand.
Paul Janish, a great kid, is here. Jay Bruce, a great kid, is here. Homer Bailey is not here. And notice I didn’t use the word great.
You wonder, just wonder, now that he has seen Janish and Bruce leave Louisville, along with Andy Phillips, can Bailey just adjust his attitude and work ethic, show some spunk instead of snarkiness and get himself up here.
It was no accident that Bruce got pie-faced and water soaked by his teammates after his debut and hardly any teammate paid attention when Bailey was here last year. Bruce is well-liked. Bailey is aloof. A loner. There is a reason for that.
Is there any way they can continue to pitch Bronson Arroyo on three days of rest? The guy is a throwback when it comes to pitching. The hair, though, keeps him off the throwback list, but he might be like Samson if they cut off those locks.
Seriously, the guy is unbelievable with only three days rest. But manager Dusty Baker can’t do it all the time because it messes up the rest of the rotation.
Some of us are old enough to remember when every team had a four-man rotation and everybody pitched on three days of rest, and most of them threw 150 pitches a game.
Call me geezer, call me old-timer, but aren’t training methods and diets and meds better these days? Heck, these guys should be able to pitch on two days of rest.
Just kidding, just kidding.
While we’re immortalizing Jay Bruce, how about some props for Jerry Hairston Jr. Yes, he is another of Dusty’s guys from his Chicago days, but Hairston is a guy who produces. Corey Patterson he isn’t.
Since Baker put him at leadoff five games ago, the Reds are 4-1 and Hairston has 10 hits. He isn’t really a shortstop, but he hasn’t burned the Reds badly while stepping in for Jeff Keppinger.
And how sweet is Bruce’s swing? Only one hit Wednesday, but it was a solid double. His first major-league out, after reaching base six straight times, was a liner to center.
Permit me to return to last spring when the Reds signed Corey Patterson to a $3.5 million contract. Once again, as I’ve written before, don’t blame fired general manager Wayne Krivsky for that one.
As he told me, “I was told to sign Patterson and get the deal done, no matter what it takes.” It took $3.5 million — $3.5 million wasted dollars.
All that did, of course, was delay the arrival of Jay Bruce, which is probably the saddest thing about this team’s early season. In two games, Bruce has done more than Patterson did in 29. Oh, Patterson did have a couple of big hits early in the season, but for what he didn’t do lately makes that ancient history.
And what used to be b-o-o-o-o-o-o-o-o-o-o-o when Patterson batted is now b-r-u-u-u-u-u-u-u-u-u-c-e when Bruce bats.
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TweetPatterson demoted, Phillips arrives
Corey Patterson is gone. Gone, but not yet forgotten.
Instead of releasing him, the Cincinnati Reds today optioned him to Class AAA Louisville and promoted infielder Andy Phillips.
In addition, they placed much-troubled infielder Alex Gonzalez on the 60-day disabled list.
Patterson, 2 for his last 30, was 0-for-18 after a pinch-hit fly ball Tuesday against the Pirates and was heavily booed before he batted and after he batted.
He was brought into training camp in mid-spring, signed to a one-year, $3.5 million contract and he made the team instead of rookie outfielder Jay Bruce.
Bruce was called up Tuesday and had three hits and two walks in his debut against the Pirates. Instead of designating Patterson, the Reds designated first baseman Scott Hatteberg.
They made the move on Patterson today and promoted Phillips, a 30-year-old right-handed infielder the Reds signed as a free agent on Jan. 4. He had an outstanding spring, playing nearly every game, but was sent to Louisville.
Phillips was hitting .315 at Louisville with five homers, 22 RBIs and two stolen bases. He played first base, third base, second base and was a designated hitter, playing most of the time at first base or third.
He will be in uniform No. 46 tonight.
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TweetOf debuts and opening days
What a debut Jay Bruce made — probably the most glossy and glittery debut on a stage since stripper Sally Rand’s first ostrich-feathered fan dance at the New York Paramount in 1932.
OK, so exotic dancer isn’t politically correct these days.
That was some dance by Bruce, though — three hits, two walks, two RBIs, two runs scored.
SPEAKING OF debuts, I’m reminded of another former No. 1 draft pick and his debut. It was left-handed pitcher C.J. Nitkowski, drafted No. 1 by the Reds in 1994. General manager Jim Bowden couldn’t wait for his arrival and called him up in June 1995.
I can remember sitting in Bowden’s box and C.J. made his first major-league start — also against the Pirates — on June 6. With every out, Bowden was jumping out his chair and high-fiving everybody, knocking over a bowl of pretzels on one out, as if Sandy Koufax was reborn.
Nitkowski pitched six innings, gave up no runs and three hits, walking three and striking out one. Was a star born? Uh, no.
Nitkowski eventually pitched for Cincinnati, Detroit, Houston, the New York Mets, Texas, the New York Yankees, Atlanta and Washington. His career record? 18-32. That’s a little more than two victories per team.
Nitkowski’s one claim to fame was that he was one of the first baseball players to have his own web-site, one he wrote himself, in the infancy of the internet.
And it is interesting that he finished his career at Washington, where Bowden is now the GM and gathers ex-Reds like numismatics collect Indian Head nickels — or is that Native American head nickels these days?
Bowden’s latest venture, after he signed and released Bret Boone (brother Aaron Boone still plays for the Nationals, along with Dmitri Young) is the signing of Pokey Reese.
Pokey Reese? He hasn’t played in a major-league game since 2004 with the Boston Red Sox. He was in camp with the Florida Marlins in the spring of 2006, but mysteriously disappeared and the Marlins released him in March.
It took two years, but Bowden found him. He is now playing at Triple-A Columbus.
MY FAVORITE story about Reese, the Reds’ No. 1 draft pick in 1991, does not concern his debut, but it was an Opening Day and Reese was playing shortstop.
He made four errors, three in one inning.
In those days, owner Marge Schott emptied the Cincinnati Zoo and brought the animals to old Riverfront Stadium for a pregame parade, including elephants. And, of course, the pachyderms did what most animals do in public. When ya gotta go, ya gotta go.
After his four-error game, Reese said, “Instead of playing shortstop, I should have been walking behind those elephants with a trash bag. Except I would have missed.”
I laugh every time I hear WLW’s Bill Cunningham play the sound bite from Reds owner Bob Castellini saying, “We’re not gonna lose any more.” Cunningham plays it over and over.
The sound bite comes from a question I asked Castellini the day he fired Wayne Krivsky and it irritated him. I asked about stability because of the steady stream of short-term managers and general managers since 2003 — managers Bob Boone, Dave Miley, Jerry Narron, Pete Mackanin, Dusty Baker and general managers Jim Bowden, Brad Kullman, Leland Maddox, Dan O’Brien, Krivsky and Walt Jocketty.
That’s when Castellini snapped at me at the press conference and said, “We’re not gonna lose any more.” He apologized to me in a corner later, but not publicly.
That’s OK, though. I understand. He is frustrated with the losing. He is a nice man and a great businessman. He is still learning the baseball gig, though.
After Castellini’s quote, I said kiddingly to Jocketty, “The owner says you’re not going to lose any more. That’s a lot of pressure, right?”
Jocketty, a man who smiles easily and has been through the baseball wars and understands the complexities of winning and losing, smiled at that and said, “The first thing I have to do is calm down the owner.”
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