It was a classic battle between the Reds' offense and pitching. The pitching struck first when Eric Milton allowed three runs in the fourth inning, but the offense came right back with three runs off Felipe Lopez's double, Rich Aurilia's homerun, and Ken Griffey Jr's homerun.

The pitching made valiant attempts by giving up a run in each of the fifth, sixth, and seventh innings. In fact, the pitching appeared to have it sewn up when, after Adam Dunn and Jason LaRue matched the runs in the fifth and sixth, the offense did not score the in seventh. Colorado was up 5-6 going into the eighth.

In a surprise move, however, the offense outscored the pitching in the bottom of the eighth. The offense plated two runs when Adam Dunn walked, Wily Mo Peña doubled him in, and Ray Olmedo came up with the clutch double to bring in Dunn and bring the score to what would be the final: 7-6 Reds.

Milton didn't give up any homeruns, but did allow three runs over the course of five innings. He was pinch-hit for by Anderson Machado in the sixth inning. Machado, whose AAA batting average is approximately fifteen points lower than Milton's major-league average, bunted out on Milton's behalf.

The Reds would send up six pitchers over the course of the game, and Jason Standridge put in an inning of scoreless work in the eighth to get the win.

Ray Olmedo again came up big tonight. Ryan Freel has already started some probably rather uncomfortable rehab time in AA Chattanooga and hopefully is soon to be back. When that happens, the mettle of the Reds management will be tested. As they make the decision of whether to send Olmedo back down, they should consider more than options and waivers. There's more than one way to skin this cat.

Griffey and Dunn are giving off a powerful positive vibe. It's as if the two of them got together over the All-Star break and said, “OK, enough of this crap: time to get it together.” Tomorrow will be a big test as they attempt to take down Ramón Ortíz.

Go Reds!

Esta mañana hecho mi viaje por los sitos de noticias de los Reds y encuentré esta historia de la difusión de algunos juegos por la radio en español.

Reds bring Spanish baseball to radio por Anthony Castrovince en The Official Cincinnati Reds Site

Pienso que este tipo de cambio es importante para la futura de béisbol. Es necesario y inteligente cuando se considera la porción de los jugadores que hablan español y las audiencias que ellos pueden atraer. Major League Baseball debe intentar de servir y perseguir los espectadores en los estado unidos y en otros países que hablan español también.

Buen hecho, Cincinnati. Yo apruebo. Ahora, solo necesita pagar mucho dinero a algunas bloggers femininas bilingues para estará aunque mejor.

We missed the Reds first game of the second half and only televised game of the weekend to see Charlie and the Chocolate Factory. I am very happy to see that the Reds have started off the second half right even without my ever-watchful eye. I never doubted it for a minute.

In fact, I was so confident that it was only minor agony to wait all the way until we got home to find out how the game had turned out. Part of that was alleviated by the movie itself. I heard that this movie received poor reviews, but I thought it was wonderful. Parts of it felt like they were written just for me, even though the whole audience was laughing and even applauded at the end.

Not only did it leave me grinning like an idiot, but it also left me with an inexplicably positive feeling about Joe Randa.

Trading in baseball is like world economics: entities exchanging goods to try to get everything they need. And though the exchange is for the benefit of everyone involved, the entities know they are ultimately in competition with each other. It's a shrewd game, but the principles for coming out a winner are simple:

• Buy low, sell high.
• Do what you do best and import the rest.
• There's a sucker born every minute.

With those principles in mind, I examined the most trade-likely Reds to see whether trading them made sense. Let's look at some of the possible participants in this game of baseball musical chairs.

Joe Randa
Oh that rakish Randa! He's a human highlights reel! He's a fan favorite! He's got to go! Here's why:

• Randa is the perfect example for “buy low, sell high.” He's high, and he hasn't given possible buyers any reason to believe he won't stay that way for the rest of the season and beyond.
• Randa is expecting to go. It seems like the only thing the press ever quotes him about. He knew the deal when he came on, and he's made the most of it. I think that not trading him now could be the kind of anti-climax that could screw him up for the rest of the season.
• Infielders we have. Which of the available infielders would be best to take his place is a discussion for its own post, but with a surplus the economical thing to do is trade for something we lack.

Rich Aurilia
Rich Aurilia and the Reds needed each other for very specific purposes. Aurilia needed to prove he wasn't entirely washed up, and the Reds needed someone to be Felipe's villain. Both have been fulfilled nicely.

Aurilia is as high as he's going to get. It is time to sell.

Sean Casey
Sean Casey is not a good candidate for trading right now. Reasons include:

• Casey occupies a power position and even the moderate power he used to have is flickering. What contender would want that? He is low; don't sell. Besides, I suspect that we'll see him make some adjustments and come into 2006 looking more like the old Casey, and then it would be reasonable to trade him if the need still exists.
• While it would clear up a spot in the over-crowded outfield, who would back up Dunn at first once Casey was gone? They had Valentín out there a lot during spring training. I don't think anyone wants that. Better to open up a spot in the outfield by moving an outfielder.
• Trading Casey would be hugely popular with tons of people online, but hugely unpopular with many more tons of real-life humans. By itself that's not a reason to make a decision, but since trading Casey would be a bad idea anyway, it just fans the fire.

No, though it's agonizing to watch him ground into another double play, the Reds are better off keeping him. Move him down in the order, give him some days off, do what you can to help him get his pop back, and hope you're not faced with this dilemma next July.

Adam Dunn
Dunn is Maybe. His value is so difficult to define. Is he high? He's a heck of a hitter when he hits. But maybe he's low, what with all those strike-outs. He sometimes looks like a liability in the field, but then again, he's real tall so maybe those long strides just give the illusion that he's slow. He seems like a real gamer one day but then he comes off as flippant the next. Maybe you don't want to build a team around him since it sounds like he will bolt for Texas as soon as free-agency rolls around, but then again, that's not for two more years so maybe you should take advantage as long as possible.

What to do, what to do. It's a question for the baseball minds of the ages. I'd act like he was the highest of the high and if someone was willing to buy at that price, give it a go. I doubt anyone would be willing to pay my price.

Ken Griffey, Jr.
Griffey is undoubtedly high, and the way he's hinting at further ascension has to be making some power-poor teams drool. The question is whether his trade value is higher than his nontrade value. Healthy or otherwise, Griffey puts butts in the seats, and anyone he was exchanged for would need to do something comparable. The Reds would only be looking to take on someone like that if they were contending, so I think this isn't the time for Griffey to go either.

Austin Kearns
Kearns is kicking ass in AAA, but he's in AAA. That's low. Someone would have to be willing to deal for him as if he were at 100% potential, and that doesn't seem likely.

Which only leaves…

Wily Mo Peña
Wily Mo could be great. Maybe he'll be phenomenal. He might just be the kind of player that leads teams to championships. That potential is real. Everyone can see it. He's high.

And it just so happens that the Reds, a team that does power outfielders well, seem to be a little heavy on power outfielders at the moment. Sounds like an opportunity to me.

Kent Mercker and David Weathers
NO! NO! NO! The Reds need to buy pitching, not get rid of what little they have that's working. They brought these guys in to be the veterans and help preen the new guys. Trading them now would not only not bring enough in return but would also defeat the purpose of bringing them here in the first place.

But that's probably what they'll do. Isn't that how Mercker got sent away last time?

And they wonder why they have no pitching.

Eric Milton
There couldn't be a much worse time to trade Eric Milton than right about now, except maybe three weeks ago. He is as low as he can get. He's nationally reknowned for how low he is. Milton is the Death Valley of major league players.

He's so low, in fact, that the Reds would have to pay him to play for someone else, and that just doesn't make sense. Even if Milton were showing no signs of improvement, which he is, it would make more sense to sit him the rest of the season than to pay him to play for someone else this early in his contract.

“But you are willing to pay Graves to play badly elsewhere,” you might say, “aren't you a freaking hypocrite?”

Well, no. Having Graves on the team was worse than having no one, so it made financial sense to pay to cut him loose. The Reds received returns on their investment: a statement that Graves' performance wasn't acceptable, the removal of an attitude from the clubhouse, and the semblance of motion, if not actually progress.

You can debate whether they got a good return for the investment, but none of those issues apply to Milton so there would be no return for paying to drop him. Move him to the bullpen, sit him if necessary, but if you have to pay him anyway, have him working for you.

Same goes for Ortíz, whom I haven't included separately because I haven't heard his name mentioned much.

So there you have it: pearls of trading wisdom from a rank amateur. Can the Reds come out on top this trading season? I hope so. At the very least, I hope they don't turn out to be the suckers.

DETROIT, MI -- Players in the 2005 All-Star Game in Detroit were stunned to find that President Bush had bombed Canada as a result of the Home Run Derby.

The Bush administration, fed up with Major League Baseball after months spent on steroids scandals and irritated about the format change of the Home Run Derby to include representatives from different countries, announced today that the All-Star Game tagline was “the last straw in a long list of baseball's lies.”

“We were tired of hearing how 'this one counts' when it doesn't count for anything,” said White House press secretary Scott McClellan, “So we decided to make it count for something and bombed the last place country.”

The last place country was Canada, whose representative Jason Bay failed to hit a single home run before earning 10 outs. Bay's performance came right after Bobby Abreu hit 24 long bombs in the first round, so 24 bombs were dropped in sparsley populated areas.

“We didn't want to hurt anyone,” said McClellan, “We just wanted to make a point.”

“We are a nation at war, and the men in our military know what things matter. Now Major League Baseball understands when something really counts,” said President Bush. “Canada has something to think about, too.”

Bush wouldn't discuss what his administration has planned for the losers of the All-Star Game tonight, but he warned the players to be on their toes.

“And don't mess with Teixeira,” Bush added as he left the podium.