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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 > 2009 > April > 11
Saturday, April 11, 2009
Quantity (of pitches) eliminates quality starts
Still waiting for that wonderful (as we all believed) starting pitching to surface for the Cincinnati Reds.
Pittsburgh Pirates 10, Cincinnati Reds 2 - or, as our favorite broadcaster said as Ryan Doumit’s grand slam home run off Mike Lincoln sky-vapored into the right field seats, “It is now officially a butt-whipping.”
It is now four-deep into the 2009 season and the Reds are still looking for a quality start (six innings, three earned runs or less).
It was Johnny Cueto’s turn Saturday and it was a thing of ugliness with a tinge of beauty. In six innings, he struck out nine Pittsburgh Pirates. But sandwiched around that like whole wheat were eight hits (five for extra bases) and four runs.
He threw 109 pitches in six innings, a recurring theme so far for the Reds rotation - way, way too many pitches, much too much wasted effort.
Cueto was down 2-0 before he got his second out of the game. Nyjer Morgan opened the game with a single and after Freddy Sanchez struck out, Nate McLouth reached the right field seats with his second home run.
Cueto got out of a mess in the fourth when right fielder Jay Bruce threw a runner out a home tring to score from second and Willy Taveras leaped against the wall to snag the third out of the inning with two on.
The Pirates scored two more in the fourth on two doubles and a triple, then Cueto retired seven in a row before he was lifted - the string of outs coming way too late.
MEANWHILE, it was as if the Reds were once again facing Johan Santana on Opening Day. Pirates lefthander Paul Maholm retired the first 11 before he walked Joey Votto. Brandon Phillips singled and Edwin Encarnacion singled, all with two outs, but Votto was thrown out at home trying to score from second.
That was the only threat the Reds had.
PIRATES LEADOFF batter Nyjer Morgan is an African American out of Los Angeles who somehow wandered into hockey and played for Regina in the Western Hockey League until he was 21. In the seventh inning he scored from second on a single. He could slid across home, but his hockey instincts took over and he drove a shoulder into catcher Ramon Hernandez as if pounding him into the boards with a body check.
It was better than Joey Votto’s slide home (he was out) in the fourth. His left foot was driven up into his body and he came up hopping on his right foot, dancing in a circle. But he stayed in the game.
Typically, the Reds scored in the seventh without a hit. Brandon Phillips walked, stole second, took third on Edwin Encarnacion’s ground ball and scored on Jay Bruce’s ground ball.
Not a good day at the old ball yard for the local nine, which is now 1-3.
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TweetFrom malaria back to good ol’ baseball
So, the diagnosis is - - - - - malaria. Malaria. You kidding me? Do I like as if I worked on the Panama Canal?
Apparently, I might have been bitten by a mosquito in Cancun last October and I contracted malaria. That’s what the doctor thinks after ruling out 84 other things. And after only a couple of days of some heavy antibiotic, I feel beter than I have in a year. Fortunately it is not contagious - unless if maybe I bit somebody - so I’m back to work today, getting a kick out of watching everybody take a step or two back after I tell them I have malaria.
WAS FUN standing on the dugout step at 10:30 this morning watching Paul Janish take about 100 hard-hit ground balls hit by coach Mark Berry.
“I’m going to do it three or four times a homestand,” said Janish. “You can take all the grounders you want during batting practice, but in these private sessions Mark really hits the ball hard and to my left and right. In my role, going into games in the eighth and ninth innings, well, that’s not the time to be sharpening up.”
MANAGER DUSTY BAKER had Edwin Encarnacion batting fifth and Jay Bruce dropped to sixth for Saturday afternoon’s game against the Pittsburgh Pirates.
“Just because we’re facing a tough lefthander (Paul Maholm), a guy who is really tough on lefthanders,” said Baker. “Jay is struggling a little bit (.167), so this takes a little pressure off him. No slight on Jay, it just depends on the lefthander and how tough he is on lefthanders.”
The thing is, Encarnacion isn’t putting too many smudge marks on baseballs right now (.143), although he does have five walks.
“He’s knocking fire from the ball in BP, so it seems he is just around the corner from getting hot,” said Baker. Encarnacion, though, sees to have more hot and cold corners than a house with air-conditioning in only half the rooms.
Of his walks, Baker said, “That’s good, especially this early in the year because it shows you’re recognizing pitches. That’s the toughest thing this part of the year because you haven’t had enough reps to really zero in on recognition of pitches.”
MICAH OWINGS isn’t scheduled to make his starting debut for the Reds until Wednesday, so for now the Reds have another long man in the bullpen and Baker said he has to find a way to keep him sharp if he isn’t used between skipped starts.
“We have to find a way to keep his endurance and pitch-count up,” said Baker. “We can’t overuse him in case we go extra innings and need him. I have to be more careful now about using him as a pinch-hitter, unless I’m going to keep him in the game to pitch. Then I have to figure out how to warm him up (to pitch) before bringing him in to pinch-hit. He hits a lot in batting practice, he loves to hit.”
IF YOU THINK my malaria is strange, Pirates manger John Russell has gout in his left arm and is wearing a bulky brace, which will be in place for a week. That may make it difficult for Russell to call in any lefthander from the bullpen.
THE SUBJECT was the changing consistency of the field from weather changes and Baker said, “I’d like to come up with new spikes for baseball, like they have for football - longer spikes and shorter spikes depending on the field and the weather. The only trouble would be sliding and with spike injuries.”
And, no, we’re not talking about women’s high heels when we talk about spikes.
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