Thursday, April 9, 2009

Snap Judgements on the Reds

Well we have had one series in the books of this 2009 season and it is WAY to early to make too many judgements on this team but lets at least point out a few tid bits.

* Lets not forget that the Mets are predicted to be one of the top teams in the NL. There were a lot of Reds fans who were quick to pass judgement on our offense after opening day but let us not forget we had the pleasure of facing Johan Santana that day, not an easy task. Since that outing the Reds have hit the ball well, so no need to panic yet.

* Jay Bruce looks like he is pressing a little right now. I think once he gets in stride he will be fine. Not All Star type numbers but he should be very productive.

* Joey Votto will more than likely be our All Star this year. His stroke is effortless and he absolutely smashes the ball. He can hit with as much power as Dunn and has way more intangibles than Dunn could ever dream of. Not ready to put Votto in the Hall of Fame yet like some Reds fans, but could easily see him pushing 40 Home Runs and 100 RBI's this season all while offering solid defense at first.

* Out of Harang, Volquez, and Arroyo Aaron Harang has given us the best outing thus far. Harang was the pitcher who a lot of Reds fans worry about. Volquez will need to work on lowering that pitch count, once again he threw a lot of pitches early in the game. Arroyo was just Arroyo, he is not a true #3 pitcher more like #5. He got the only W so far so hard to complain too much.

* Outside of a rough outing from Herrara and Lincoln the bullpen has been absolutely lights out. Cordero came out today and got three K's to get the save. Arthur Rhodes has pitched phenomenal thus far. The bullpen is stacked and will help us win some ball games this year.

* Left side of the infield has been less than impressive so far. Edwin is starting the season 1-7, we will need a lot more offense out of him to justify having him on the field cause he ain't winning any Gold Gloves anytime soon. Gonzalez is 0-6 starting the season, he is not expected to hit the ball but is also expected to do it with the glove and had a critical error on Wednesday night. Hopefully they can both get something going.

3 comments:

XU said...

We still lack a bench, I mean Laynce Nix and Darnell McDonald has been getting starts....common! I hear people nagging about bringing up Gomes but is he much of an upgrade? We needed to more in the offseason to fix this problem, too bad we put most of our money into the stadium and not the players, although I'm quite fond of the $5 million scoreboard.

Anonymous said...

Yeah, its a nice scoreboard!

I just want to point out that Arthur Rhodes has thrown 20 pitches so far this year, 19 for strikes. Thats crazy.

I think Jay Bruce may struggle for a while, may even go back to AAA for a short stint. I could be wrong.

Harang still concerns me, he through an awful lot of balls on Monday and doesn't have the same speed on his fastball.

I like this team and the direction.

Adam said...

I agree with you on Rhodes but also remember he is 39 years old so we can't expect this to continue on this path. I don't see the Reds sending Bruce down to AAA. It would do him no good, he needs to work through these issues on this level.