Mark your calendars. Your friendly neighborhood Red Hot Mama (and another blogger you might have heard of) will be taking in a game on September 23, 2006.

Pencil in the game if you'd like to sit around making fun of the Cubs with me. Ought to be a rollicking good time.

George Grande just said that Edwin Encarnación, who went down hard between second and third bases looking like he popped a hammy, in fact has just a mild ankle sprain and is day-to-day.

Whew.

And only 21 1/2 hours later, I finally get around to mentioning that Justin Germano was sent back to Louisville last night to make room for Joe Mays.

Germano was told he was being optioned back to Louisville so he can get some more work -- he hasn't pitched since last Tuesday -- and the Reds will bring in Joe Mays to take his roster spot tomorrow. Narron was quite clear that Mays will be working out of the bullpen.

That's Joe Mays, not Darrell May, who was not re-signed, no matter what some snarky news reports implied.

Impossible not to notice that this “long reliever” came up the same day that Brandon Claussen needed over 100 pitches for five innings of work.

If you made it out to Deadspin today, you probably saw this tidbit in which Will made “Isringhausen” into a verb:

3. Junior Mint. It is our belief that Ken Griffey Jr. will play until he's 60, owing to all the time spent on the sidelines due to injury. He's like the collectible action figure that you never take out of the box. On Monday at New Busch, Griffey Isringhausened the Cardinals, hitting a three-run homer in the ninth to give the Reds an 8-7 win. He also had a solo homer earlier in the game, tying a major league record by homering in his 43rd stadium.

Making Cardinals names into regular words is a great idea. See if you can work these words into your regular vocabulary:

Eckstein, n.
1. Any of various small, monochromatic mammals having long teeth for gnawing and a nervous, twitchy nature, such as a lab rat or Guinea pig.

2. A person regarded as twitchy or annoying.

Example: My blind date was cute enough, but things went sour when I realized he was an Eckstein.

Pujols, v.
1. To lie about one's age, often used with “pulled a.”

Example: When the cute waiter asked what birthday she was celebrating, she pulled a Pujols and said she was 29.

Edmonds, adj.
1. Full of playful allure, esp. expressing a coquettish nature through dress, make-up, and hair.

Example: Ryan knew he could get some play from the Edmonds chick.

With their first round pick in today's draft, the Reds picked Robert Stubbs, a college outfielder from Texas Austin University.

MLB.com's DraftCaster describes Stubbs as having gold glove defensive skills already. He also has “a power and speed combination that is tempered by his strikeout rate.”

That sounds very familiar. However, I'm not unhappy about this. The Reds over the years, for whatever reason, have had wonderful success at creating productive outfielders. There's no reason they should use their best draft picks in an attempt to find pitching at the expense of playing to that strength.