Have Faith in the Cincinnati Reds, My View Through (Pete) Rose-Colored Glasses!

I know the Cincinnati Reds have entered the All-Star break at 45 wins and 47 losses. I have been disappointed in their results so far this season. Coming off of last year's National League Central Division Championship I thought the Reds would be a team that ended up with 90 plus wins this year and a second straight playoff appearance.

In my mind there were two primary questions that the Reds needed to deal with that remained unanswered to my satisfaction following Spring training. Would Jonny Gomes prove to be effective as an every day left fielder? And was Paul Janish ready to be the every day shortstop?

The answer to both questions was no. I addition, many of what looked like strengths of the Reds coming out of Spring training have proven to be troublesome in the first 92 games of the season. Drew Stubbs has struggled at lead-off and currently leads the National League in strikeouts. Injuries and an ineffective Edinson Volquez have hurt the Reds' starting pitching. Paul Janish and his back-up Edgar Renteria have played so poorly at shortstop that the Reds were forced to promote Zack Cozart from their AAA Louisville affiliate. And if that wasn't bad enough, Francisco Cordero blew three straight save opportunities going into the All-Star break.

But I choose to look at the Reds and their prospects for the second half of the season through (Pete) Rose-colored glasses!

Scott Rolen is getting back to full strength. Joey Votto, Jay Bruce and Brandon Phillips are having All-Star seasons. Catching has been a positive for the team. And the depth of starting pitching may finally pay off.

The best news? The Reds are only 4 games back of Milwaukee and St. Louis in the National League Central. And they open the second half of the season tomorrow at Great American Ball Park against the hated Cardinals. It's not going to take major improvements in their weak areas to make a big difference for the Reds!

So, as a fan and the ultimate optimist, I can still visualize a National League Central Division Championship and a second straight playoff appearance for the 2011 Cincinnati Reds!

All the 2011 Reds need to do is to adopt Pete Rose's philosophy. As he famously said, "Somebody's gotta win and somebody's gotta lose and I believe in letting the other guy lose."

This weekend is a good time to start!

More Gamesmanship From The Cardinals' Tony La Russa

Last night's (4/22/11) game between the Cincinnati Reds and the St. Louis Cardinals was a complete debacle. The Reds lost 4-2, which was bad enough. But the real controversy was how the St. Louis Cardinals handled the storms that were rolling through the area and caused an over 2 hour delay of the game.

The game started on time. After Drew Stubbs drew a walk and one pitch was thrown to Brandon Phillips, the game was halted for 2 hours and 10 minutes due to very heavy rains.

Why was the game started? After the delay Dusty Baker chose not to pitch the scheduled starter, Edinson Volquez as he had already warmed up once. Matt Maloney ended up getting the start.

Tony La Russa, He Invented Baseball!

Listening to today's Reds broadcast on 700 WLW, Marty Brennaman, Reds Hall of Fame play-by-play man, reported that many people in the Reds camp are not happy, placing the responsibility firmly on Cardinals' Manager Tony La Russa, who may have withheld weather information from the umpires and the Reds. Marty also commented he had never seen anything like it in 38 years of covering baseball. This is all conjecture on Marty's part, but John Fay, beat writer for the Reds at the Cincinnati Enquirer is also suspicious. So is Dusty Baker.

My take? This is a typical Tony La Russa move. But what would you expect from the smartest man in baseball? He invented the game didn't he? He can also decide when and how to report the weather.

Here's La Russa's comments on the subject, vague as usual:

"The information that we had is the same information the Reds had," La Russa said on Saturday. "They said there was a window of 45 minutes to an hour, and C.J. [St. Louis traveling secretary C.J. Cherre] talked to two different people with the Reds and said, 'Look, they're not going to start their guy when we're only going to play a short amount of time.' There was a big enough window where you get ... You just don't want to burn the starter.

"Around 6:40, 6:45, they said, 'Look, we're going to start on time.' I said, 'Well, we're going to start Batista, and 'C.J. be sure and let them know that's what we're going to do.'"

Guilty as charged, your Honor!

Coverage on the Reds official website:

http://cincinnati.reds.mlb.com/news/article.jsp?ymd=20110423&content_id=18159306&vkey=news_cin&c_id=cin

John Fay's blog on Cincinnati.com on the subject:

http://cincinnati.com/blogs/reds/2011/04/23/rain-rain-story-wont-go-away/