Sports Today: Reds keeping it interesting without even doing anything

As the MLB Winter Meetings go on in Florida, lots of noteworthy stuff keeps coming from the Cincinnati Reds.

They may not make any moves, but there is plenty of intrigue for 2018 — especially if you're as optimistic as Dick Williams seems to be.

I wrote about this yesterday but it bears repeating: The Reds general manager was remarkably forthcoming in an interview with MLB Network.

He says the team is being “opportunistic” when it comes to buying or selling right now, but he believes they can be in a position to start adding talent to the major-league team soon.

The Reds are more committed to Jose Peraza than has previously been publicized, and Raisel Iglesias is apparently not likely to go anywhere, either.

The reports about potential trades involving Iglesias and Billy Hamilton (separate deals) might have something in common: The team isn’t against trading them but will basically only do so if they get some sort of deal that looks bad for the other team.

That type of approach may be what landed them Luis Castillo last winter.

They were happy to keep Dan Straily, but they loved Castillo (for good reason) so they waited until the Marlins were willing to give him up then pulled the trigger.

On top of that, Bryan Price shared his vision of the 2018 starting rotation. 

According to MLB.com, Price apparently is penciling in Castillo, Homer Bailey, Anthony DeSclafani and Brandon Finnegan while three youngsters who finished last year strong — Sal Romano, Robert Stephenson and Tyler Mahle — compete for the fifth spot.

That strikes me as a little odd given that the latter trio have all done things successfully in the majors more recently than DeSclafani or Finnegan, but I guess we’ll see how it shakes out.

Maybe they don’t want to rush the young guys because their innings will be limited anyway.

He also said Michael Lorenzen will get a chance to start and two unnamed starters are going to the bullpen…

This would probably be a pretty boring week to cover the Cincinnati Bengals except for the opponent. 

More specifically that would be the head coach of the Vikings, Mike Zimmer.

The former Bengals defensive coordinator still elicits praise from the guys in orange and black who played for him, and he went to bat for Marvin Lewis on a conference call with Southwest Ohio media Wednesday.

"Marvin has done some unbelievable things for that organization," Zimmer said. "Honestly, he deserves to be there as long as he wants to be, in my opinion. I know how good of a coach Marvin Lewis is. I know what kind of person he is. I know he's good for that community. And I know what he's done for 99 percent of the players there. It would be a tremendous loss if he wasn't back."

He’s right Lewis has done a lot of great things for the organization, but nobody gets a lifetime contract.

Even Paul Brown stepped down eventually, and he, you know, practically invented modern football.

RELATED: How the Bengals can still get something out of the end of this season

Lewis himself seemed a bit wistful, saying everyone knows these things come to an end eventually.

Pair that with Sean McDonough on Monday Night Football saying Lewis gave them the impression he feels his days are numbered because the team hasn’t met expectations and it’s easy to see the writing on the wall.

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