That title would be so much better if Aaron Harang’s nickname was “Arms.” He certainly has some significant arms–well, one significant arm at least. Come to think of it, I can’t think of any particular nickname that Harang does have, so maybe I could just start calling him that. On the other hand, it seems a little late in the game to be starting that sort of nonsense.

Big day today. Last game of the season, and almost certainly the last time one Mr. Aaron Harang will start for the Reds. Harang is the only player currently on the active roster who has been there since RHM first started up five years ago, and it’s a sad feeling to think that one thing that has always been the same won’t continue to be there next season.

The first RHM post that mentions Harang was published on April 26, 2005. Other players mentioned in that post include:

• Adam Dunn
• Austin Kearns
• Rich Aurilia
• Joe Randa
• Ken Griffey, Jr.

Wait, it gets better…

• Ryan Wagner
• Danny Graves

Since then, we’ve gone through a lot together. In 2005, we awarded him the Anti-Milton award for not sucking. In 2006, we roughly photoshopped his photo to make him look like a goth and that photo that still appears on the first page of results on a Google image search for Aaron Harang.

We congratulated him when his daughter was born (in fact, today is her fourth birthday) and applauded when he signed on for four years with the team.

We smiled approvingly when he started the “Aaron’s Aces” ticket program in 2007 that provided free game tickets for children of military personnel and when people were putting his name together with “Cy Young” in the same sentence.

Later, we groaned when the offense began reading his name on the line-up card as “please don’t score” and even called him “Lemon” Harang once or twice. I guess he did have a bit of a nickname after all. We could also call him “The guy who had an emergency appendectomy that ended his season in 2009.” That one rolls off the tongue too.

It’s been a good run with Harang. Through the team’s ups and downs, he’s been the shy, understated constant who always seemed to draw Chris Carpenter and Carlos Zambrano. Sometimes great, sometimes not so much, but he always gave the fans hope. And I hope that he’s able to find continued success in his post-Cincinnati career, after one quick World Series win.

The Cincinnati Reds clinched the NLC Division tonight with a walk-off home run from everyone’s second favorite left-handed slugger, Jay Bruce.

From the first pitch, the game had a buzz. When the team left on the road trip, the discussion began about whether the team would clinch on the road, and when they came home with a magic number of 1, Reds fans were bursting with anticipation.

Enter the Cardinals. They were in an ugly position yesterday. Probably the single-most unpleasant thing they could have done to the team was to lose and leave us to awkwardly begin celebrating in the middle of an off-day, but that would have also meant eliminating themselves with a loss against the Pirates. Happily for everyone, they saved their crash-and-burn at the hands of the Pirates until tonight. They lost 7-2 tonight.

So the team was set up for high drama. The fans were on the edge of their seats from the beginning, and they were scrutinizing every play with the highest of expectations. Drew Stubbs’ double off the wall in left field almost brought a groan that it didn’t have that extra 18″ it needed to go over the wall.

Edinson Volquez was great. Aroldis Chapman brought the heat. Scott Rolen did his RBI thang. But even so, the Reds found themselves tied with the Astros going into the ninth inning. Did the fans in the stands realize at that point that it was a karmic necessity for the team to go into the bottom of the ninth in that situation? I don’t know. But it was clear as soon as the ball left Jay Bruce’s bat that there couldn’t have been a better way to win.

Five more games remain in the season, and the Reds will be trying to gain some advantage in the home-field, though probably not as hard as they try to prepare everyone for the post-season, which they are now most definitely going to.

I could get used to typing things like that.

Aroldis Chapman was brought into the extra-innings game against the Pittsburgh Pirates last night and dominated, striking out 2 and getting a ground-out from the third. I don’t know where he fits into the future versions of the Cincinnati Reds, but he was electric last night, and I could easily seeing him supplanting Francisco Cordero in the playoffs, should Cordero continue to struggle.

Here’s Chapman throwing a 101mph heater and striking out a batter.

Jonny Gomes has been quite entertaining in his time with the Cincinnati Reds. One of the things he’s known for is his ticks before each pitch of his at-bat. He steps out of the box and fiddles with his batting gloves and his helmet. Here’s some video of him doing just that, followed by a single.

The RHM crew were there in Spring Training for one of Aroldis Chapman’s appearances. And we caught one of his performances with the Bats when they stopped by Indianapolis. We weren’t in Cincinnati for his Major League debut last night, but we were glued to the television. Dusty Baker said it best, “We weren’t disappointed.”

No, no we were not.

Aroldis Chapman came on in the 8th with the Reds holding a comfortable 8-3 lead. It was the perfect opportunity for him to get his feet wet, and if he wasn’t sharp, the damage could be controlled. There was no need for damage control. Chapman’s first pitch was a 98 mile-per-hour fastball strike to Jonathan Lucroy. Next was an 86 mph slider that Lucroy swung and missed at, followed by fouling off a 102 mph fastball, before striking out on another 86 mph slider. Lucroy just became Chapman’s first big league strikeout.

Chapman’s pitch count ended up being 8 for his inning of work. 7 of them were strikes. After the initial strikeout, he got groundouts from Craig Counsell and Carlos Gomez, all while continuously throwing 100 mph or above.

What a debut. The crowd was on their feet for the 8th inning, to see the marvelous Cuban pitching phenom. And I sat at home, visions of Chapman mowing down postseason opposition in my head. A long time ago I worried about Chapman getting some terrible injury before he ever made it to Cincinnati and how hard I thought it would be to be the people in charge of deciding when Chapman was called up. Kudos to them. They’ve done a perfect job.