April 8, 2013

Rose debuted 50 years ago and today he’s hawking furniture

Pete Rose showing off his excellent taste in head-gear.

Pete Rose showing off his excellent taste in head-gear.

Aside: At first I wrote that headline as “hocking” furniture, since I’ve really only heard, and not read, the phrase. After a little internet research I realized that, in that sentence, “hocking” would mean “pawning.”

Thought I think Rose probably makes enough money writing things on baseballs that he doesn’t need to hock the end tables, I still think it might be a Freudian slip. After all, pawn shops do kind of bring to mind the same ambiance as I imagine being around Rose basically all of the time.

The Hardball Times is marking today as the 50th anniversary of Pete Rose’s major league debut. Chris Jaffe says:

Rose has been such a big name for such a long time that it’s easy to assume he’s always been part of the baseball landscape, but of course that wasn’t the case. Fifty years ago today he was just a cocky young middle infielder who was certain he belonged in the major leagues.

In his first trip to the big league plate on April 8, 1963, Rose got on base, though without getting a hit. Pirates pitcher Earl Francis walked him. Though Rose typically looked for a hit, he wasn’t excessively aggressive. He walked in about one-tenth of his big league trips, ending his career with 1,566 walks, 14th most all time.

Chris provides a lot more details, and also enumerates a load of other events that make today special in history. Read the whole story over at The Hardball Times.

I’ve been on vacation for over a week, so last night was the first regular-season Reds game I’ve gotten to watch on TV. And so while we’re on the topic of Rose anyway, I wanted to draw attention to this Muenchens Furniture commercial featuring him and his fiancee (or did they get married already? Hits and Mrs was taken off the air before I got completely steeped in minutia of Rose’s personal life):

“Wow! We’ll take it all!”…it’s just so poignant.

April 8, 2013

In brief: 27 of Reds’ 38 runs all from 6 guys

This is an old picture from 2009, but Cueto was probably wearing about the same shirt yesterday.

This is an old picture from 2009, but he was probably wearing about the same shirt yesterday.

Last game
The Reds won their second tough series in a row to start the season last night. Johnny Cueto put his 6 innings of 3-run ball again Steve Strasburg’s 5.1 innings of 6-run pitching to win the rubber game against the Nationals. The offense just barely got him the win, breaking a 3-3 tie in the inning when Cueto came out of the game.

Sean Marshall finally got to make an appearance, having been unavailable before due to shoulder fatigue. Jonathon Broxton and Aroldis Chapman also put in an inning. All three of the relief innings were pointless. As in, no points were scored.

Derrick Robinson, the young guy brought up when Ryan Ludwick got hurt, got his first major league hit and got to score a run when pinch hitting for Cueto in the sixth. He got a standing ovation for that. Jay Bruce was the most productive contributor, going 2-for-5 with 3 RBI.

Next game
The Reds go to visit the Cardinals tonight. Mat Latos (RHP, 0-0, 4.05 ERA) will face off against Jaime Garcia (LHP, 1-0, 1.59 ERA). It’s one of those weird early-spring start times: first pitch at 4:15 p.m.

Above average
We’re only 6 games in to the season, but so far the Reds’ offense has been highly present. It’s a nice change of pace from last season. Here are some tidbits that jump out at me as I look at the stats:

  • Todd Frazier has 9 RBI. That’s almost 30% of the teams’ total 38 runs so far. He’s also hitting .480 in 25 ABs.
  • Of the 6 guys who have played in all 6 games, 3 are hitting over .300. NOT among them: Joey Votto. He’s hitting only .238. He has, however, taken 8 walks already. Even that only gets him the third highest OBP of those 6 guys.
  • The one with the highest OBP is Frazier, of course. Second is Shin-Soo Choo. He’s 9-for-24 so far with 3 walks. He’s getting on base at a .516 clip. This guy has been a real boon so far.

This is awesome! And I’m sure it’s going to last.

What to say to sound smart at the water cooler
The Reds were only 3-3 after their first 2 series last year against the Marlins (2-1) and the Cardinals (1-2).

March 31, 2013

Opening Day with a Baseball Layman: The 5 Worst Things about Baseball.

Hello, baseball fans!  Today is among the biggest days of the baseball calendar, and since the Red Hot Family has elected to spend Opening Day discreetly peeking into every police box in Britain, I have been called into service to provide you with the content you crave so ravenously after a grueling offseason.

Now you may be wondering: what does a fair-weather Reds fan with tepid interest in baseball in general have to offer you, the erudite, blog-reading maven you are? Perspective, and list-based content, of course!  I have compiled for your reading pleasure the five best and worst aspects of baseball to a layman such as myself. We’ll get to the good stuff a little later, let’s start with the crap.

(In no particular order)

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#5   Brawls and the aftermath

Grown-ass men.

Just like in all sports, baseball teams frequently piss each other off, both intentionally and unintentionally. The boiling point of this conflict tends to be the classic bench clearing brawl.  It frequently begins with the batter losing his cool and attacking the pitcher, which can have two hilarious outcomes.  Either the batter gets unceremoniously dumped from behind by the pursuing catcher, or the batter quickly realizing he’s in over his head and waits for his teammates to “hold him back”.

More commonly, however, a big sweaty wrestling match between grown men will occur until everyone loses interest.  The most offensively stupid aspect of this is that players and fans will whine about the events of the brawl after the players actively participated in it.  The most Reds-relevant example of this is the infamous Cueto-LaRue incident in 2010.  As everyone here surely remembers, Johnny Cueto started kicking in the scrum and gave Jason LaRue a concussion that ended his career.  Reds fans defended Cueto as safeguarding himself in a chaotic situation, while Cards fans decried Cueto’s irresponsible behavior.

Let’s revisit those ideas once more in roleplay:

a Cards Fan: “Johnny Cueto should have been more careful to not hurt anyone while fighting 30 professional athletes simultaneously!”

a Reds Fan: “Johnny Cueto had to kick someone in the head to keep himself safe in a giant fight that he entered willingly!”

Maybe we could avoid all injury by not settling matters like 5-year-olds?  I can hear the purists now, though, ranting and raving about the conventions and standards that the players of the game have upheld for generations!  Which reminds me…

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#4   Unwritten Rules

Dusty excited to use Arredondo against the heart of the order in the 9th inning of a tie game with 2 runners on. Gotta save Chapman for the 11th!

Every now and then, curiosity will get the better of me and I’ll google a list of the unwritten rules of baseball. A lot of them exist to promote good sportsmanship, like not stealing when up big or taking the first strike after back to back homers.  This is all fine, but why not just have “Be a good sport” as the rule?  I don’t understand why these rules have to be so specific.

Beyond that, a lot of the rules I read are axioms on what should always be done in specific game situations. One example is only using your closer in late-game situations and with the lead. These are great because hard-and-fast rules that make no exceptions for the context of the game are always the best.  As a manager, why would you want to make a hard decision and take the blame for it when you can just cop out and regurgitate the cliche to the media afterwards?

Still more of these rules are in place because of the immense superstition held by seemingly everyone in the sport.  Hey! Speaking of the backward thinking of cavemen…

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#3   The Boys’ Club

Knudson DEFINITELY NOT THROWING LIKE A GIRL.

Nothing chaps my ass quite like idiots justifying their idiocy with an indignant “that’s the way it’s always been.” Baseball is hardly the only sport with gender issues, but baseball’s own issues came to the forefront in 2006 with Keith Hernandez’s on-air comments regarding Padres massage therapist Kelly Calabrese.

“I won’t say women belong in the kitchen. But they don’t belong in the dugout.”

As the expression goes, a gaffe is when you tell the truth.  Hernandez was properly excoriated for the comment in the media, but he unwittingly gave us a peek at a significant school of thought that exists in the baseball world.

But in the non-baseball world women have been (more or less) treated as equals to men for decades now, how about a group with more 2013 media buzz?  Let’s ask former Brewer Mark Knudsen!

“Personal agendas are not welcome. Nothing that infringes on the cohesiveness of the locker room can be tolerated…That’s why it remains the best option for any homosexual athlete in a team sport to keep his orientation private.”

Nothing worse than those selfish gays ruining everything with their personal agendas of gayness. When I picture the united locker room of a champion, it needs one out of every ten players deathly afraid that their secret become known and their career ending because of it.

Once again, baseball is not unique among sports with these problems, and it is not necessarily fair to paint baseball with a broad brush due to isolated comments.  However, these ideas obviously persist in a significant amount of the baseball industry, and they will never ever be acceptable.

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 #2   The Farm System

Now that all the icky social issues are out of the way, let’s move on to something more small potatoes.  Of the 3 major sports in the United States, baseball has by far the least compelling farm system in terms of competition.

NCAA baseball is a putrid mess of unfair playing practices and regional bias.  As the season starts in February-March, cold-weather schools are forced to play every single game on the road until their campus weather permits play. NCAA Tournament selection occurs on Memorial Day, so these schools never have an opportunity to balance their schedule.  Notable collegiate prospects don’t want to shoot their own careers in the foot, and thus opt to play for warm-weather schools, and the cycle continues.  Only 4 of the last 30 NCAA baseball champions came from cold-weather states.

Minor league baseball is a step up.  The stadium environments are family friendly and some of the most affordable sporting events one can attend.  However, their ultimate purpose of grooming talent rather than winning championships puts a cap on how attached one can be to a team.

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Well, at least the umps have never screwed up anything REALLY important.

 #1   Fear of technology

Baseball has a unique advantage over other sports in that there are relatively few judgment calls that umpires are forced to make like fouls in basketball or pass interference penalties in football.  In theory, fair or foul, strike or ball, and out or safe are black-and-white calls to be made with as much consistency as possible. However, baseball seems the most reticent of the major sports to place trust in replay and ball placement technology.  There seems to be significant resistance to depowering the umpires, which I can’t fathom.

There is no argument that replay in all facets will result in fewer calls being missed, and replay delays and other issues in more tech-friendly sports are nearly invariably due to referee ineptitude.

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Are you all pissed at me yet?  Are you dutifully reading the entirety of the article before meticulously destroying my points in the comments? Good! I can’t wait to hear from you!

 

Stay tuned for my 5 best things about baseball. Yeah, I really do like baseball!

 

March 29, 2013

Reds Opening Day and Night Schedule

Jim Day and Jeff Piecoro dressed up to the 9s for Opening Night.

Jim Day and Jeff Piecoro dressed up to the 9s for Opening Night.

The Cincinnati Reds are one of the best at starting their season off right. The RHM family has always enjoyed Opening Night since the new ownership decided to make it a thing. Unfortunately, this year we’ll be missing it by being out of the country for a long overdue vacation, but if you’re in the area, you should participate. It will be worth your time.

Here’s a list of everything the Reds have planned for both Opening Day and Opening Night.

Opening Day: Monday, April 1 – Reds vs. Angels, 4:10 pm (Gates open at 1:10 pm)

  • Opening Day Block Party: The second annual Reds Community Fund Charity Block Party kicks off at 11 am on Joe Nuxhall Way and Freedom Way. Food and beverages will be available for purchase from Budweiser, Coca-Cola, LaRosa’s, Queen City Sausage, UDF and Kahn’s. Admission is free. Music provided by WEBN. All proceeds benefit the Reds Community Fund’s P&G MLB Urban Youth Academy.
  • 94th Findlay Market Opening Day Parade Grand Marshal: Reds Hall of Famer George Foster will serve as the Grand Marshal of the Findlay Market parade, which begins at Noon.
  • Ceremonial First Pitch: Joe Torre, manager of Team USA in the 2013 World Baseball Classic, will throw out the ceremonial first pitch.
  • National Anthem: Cincinnati firefighter John Winfrey will sing the National Anthem.
  • Honorary Captain: Bob Kevoian from the nationally syndicated Bob & Tom Show radio program will serve as the Honorary Captain of the Game.
  • Game Ball Delivery: Fire Chief Richard A. Braun of the Cincinnati Fire Department will deliver the official Game Ball to the mound during pregame ceremonies.
  • Flyover: Two T-28 Trojans and one B-25 Mitchell from the Tri-State Warbird Museum in Batavia will perform a pregame flyover.
  • Wounded Hero Recognition: Senators Rob Portman (R-OH) and Sherrod Brown (D-OH) will participate in a pregame ceremony to honor wounded heroes.
  • Moment of Remembrance: To honor the victims of the tragic Sandy Hook Elementary School shooting in Newtown, CT, the Reds (and all MLB teams) are wearing a symbolic ribbon patch and will observe a pregame moment of remembrance.
  • American Flag: Members of the Cincinnati Fire Department will hold the giant American flag during the National Anthem. The Cincinnati Fire Department is celebrating its 160th year in 2013. The Cincinnati Fire Department was organized in 1853 and is the nation’s oldest fully paid professional fire department.
  • God Bless America: Local quartet The Mistics will sing God Bless America during the seventh-inning stretch.
  • Rally Towels: “This is Reds Country” rally towels will be distributed at the gates (while supplies last), courtesy of Cincinnati Bell, Horseshoe Casino, Kroger, Homemade Brand Ice Cream/UDF and P&G.

After the game, fireworks lit up the sky to cap a fun Opening Night.

After the game, fireworks lit up the sky to cap a fun Opening Night.

Opening Night: Wednesday, April 3 – Reds vs. Angels, 7:10 pm (Gates open at 5:10 pm)

  • Reds in the Fan Zone: Reds players and coaches to appear in the Kroger Fan Zone to walk the red carpet starting at 5:30 pm.
  • National Anthem: Arin Ray, top 10 finalist on the X Factor and School for Creative & Performing Arts senior, will sing the National Anthem.
  • 2013 Reds Calendar: The first 20,000 fans will receive a 2013 Team Calendar, presented by Kroger.
  • Silver Slugger: 2012 NL Louisville Slugger Silver Slugger winner Jay Bruce will receive his award during pregame ceremonies.
  • Ball Delivery: Miss Ohio Kristin Smith and Miss Teen Ohio Brittany Reid will deliver the official Game Ball to the mound during pregame ceremonies.
  • Rusty Griswolds: 80’s cover band The Rusty Griswolds will perform from a stage at the new Budweiser Bowtie Bar located on the right field porch during inning breaks and after the game.
  • Postgame Fireworks presented by TriHealth: The Rusty Griswolds will play live during the post-game fireworks show featuring Rozzi’s Famous Fireworks.
March 28, 2013

In brief: a taste of winning yet to come

Ryan Ludwick laying off a ball outside.

Ryan Ludwick laying off a ball outside.

Last game
The Reds were winners again yesterday, taking down the Padres 3-7. Mike Leake did the starting for the team and had a good outing: 1 run on 5 hits in 6.0 innings.

Ryan Ludwick came through big time with a 3-run homer in the seventh inning to break the 1-1 tie and give the Reds a lead they wouldn’t lose. Joey Votto also his a home run to provide some padding and something us to talk about.

Next game
Today the Reds host the Royals at 4:05 p.m. Mat Latos will be taking his turn at last-chance-to-rock-spring training.

Please welcome our guest posters
The Red Hot Family is taking a vacation! We’re heading to that traditional spring break destination of London, England. Damn the luck that spring break is falling on the week of Opening Day and Opening Night, which has been our favorite tradition for the last 2 years.

I don’t even know if they get ESPN across the pond, let alone Fox Sports Ohio, so we’ve bribed a couple guest bloggers with the promise of scones to take over while we’re gone. They’re both far more knowledgeable and emphatic about sports than I am, so I expect to see some real high quality content here for the next week for a change.

But don’t worry! We’ll be back to writing the same goofy crap you’ve grown accustomed to before you know it.

What to say to sound smart at the water cooler
The Reds have 2 more pitchers to cut before opening day. Which is just 4 days away.