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John Fay
John Fay has been the Reds beat writer for the Enquirer since 2001. Prior to that, he served in a variety of roles for the Enquirer: backup Reds writer, UC beat writer, backup Bengals writer and as a general assignment reporter. He is a Cincinnati native and a graduate of Elder High School and the University of Dayton.

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Friday, May 25, 2007

Last night's leftovers; Votto smoking

I talked to David Ross today about the play in the eighth inning last night. He wasn't around after the game last night.

"I saw the third baseman go after the ball. I thought I could make it. Then halfway there I saw the pitcher. I knew I was out. Stupid play. My run doesn't mean anything with us down 3. Then Alex (Gonzalez) hits the home run to make me feel worse."

Jeff Conine was told to bunt in the ninth. "I asked him about," Jerry Narron said, "because I had a feeling Brandon Phillips was going to get on. He was fine with bunting." Narron pointed out that while the Reds are ripped for not getting bunts down, they're second in the NL in sacrifice hits. You could look it up.

Joey Votto is tearing it up at Louisville. From Jamie Ramsey:

APRIL JOEY VOTTO vs. MAY JOEY VOTTO
In April: .192ba, 15-for-78, 12r, 4 doubles, 2hr, 11rbi, 17bb, 23k, .347obp
In May: .425ba, 34-for-80, 17r, 3 doubles, 5hr, 12rbi, 12bb, 12k, .500obp

Votto’s .425 batting average and 52 total bases in May both rank second in the International League.


22 Comments:

at 5:21 PM Anonymous Anonymous said...

If Im reading the Reds players stats correctly most of those sacrifice bunts have been by Reds pitchers.

David Ross is the only position player that has more than 1 sacrifice bunt.

 
at 5:25 PM Anonymous Anonymous said...

Could we stop talking about guys in the farm system, and get rid of the real problem. Narron.

Hitting Phillips in the 4 hole is just stupid!

Perk, Atlanta

 
at 5:31 PM Blogger Fred Goose said...

too bad Votto is a prospect and not a retread veteran, otherwise he might get some playing time here

 
at 6:00 PM Anonymous Anonymous said...

The dummy is sitting DUNN tonight. NARRON is utterly incompetent.

FIRE HIM NOW!!!

 
at 6:06 PM Anonymous Anonymous said...

Fred Goose, that's brilliant. These aren't the Reds, these are the retREaDS!!!

If you're a mediocre semi-washed-up lifetime .246 hitter you can always come to Cincinnati and START while a 22-year old hitting .330 waits for you in the Reds minor leagues!

BRILLIANT! Is Guiness a sponsor?

The retREaDS!!!! BRILLIANT!!!

 
at 7:44 PM Anonymous Anonymous said...

if you plan to bunt, why not pinch hit for Conine with a guy who knows how to bunt?

 
at 8:03 PM Blogger John Fay said...

Who would that be? Hopper had already been used. And Conine has seven sacrifices in his career.

 
at 8:18 PM Anonymous Anonymous said...

Seven sacrifices in a career as long as his isn't great. I don't know though. Castro? One of the starting pitchers?

 
at 8:36 PM Anonymous Anonymous said...

Two words: Joe Girardi

 
at 8:53 PM Blogger Krawhitham said...

mikec said...

if you plan to bunt, why not pinch hit for Conine with a guy who knows how to bunt?

John Fay said...

Who would that be? Hopper had already been used. And Conine has seven sacrifices in his career.

A pitcher, one of the starters maybe. YEAH YEAH YEAH if you put a pitcher in they know a bunt is coming, but like you said the Reds are 2nd in sacrifice bunts with most of them by pitchers when the other team knew it was coming

Conine has only 7 sacrifice bunts out of 6792 ABs (he bunts .00103% of the time)

 
at 10:02 PM Anonymous Anonymous said...

That's it. I'm done. I've watched all or part of every game this season and probably watched 130 games or so last year. And I can't do it anymore. This team is horrible and I'm not wasting my time anymore and putting myself through watching this mess. I might still pop on the blog here and maybe watch a game or two if they bring up Bailey or Dumatrait, but I'm not watching regularly. I've been a Reds fan since I was seven and I've never given up on them this early in the year.

This is pathetic.

 
at 10:27 PM Anonymous Anonymous said...

Gee, I hope you're happy, NARRON. Dunn is nice and rested and the Reds only scored 2 runs through 9...that little rally in the bottom of the tenth only further exposes the idiocy that is you. As a manager, you are a loser.

DUMMY

 
at 10:42 PM Blogger HK said...

HK said...
Instead of sending Coffey down,maybe we should send Narron and his staff down!!!!!!!!!

 
at 10:58 PM Blogger Thomas said...

How is it Narron's fault that this team lacks talent at the major league level and won't pull up its talented younger players from the minors? I'm only pretty sure, but I think that the GM holds the final decision over player movements... I'm only pretty sure though. Ha. Blame Narron all you want, but Narron cannot pull Bailey, Dumatrait or Votto up himself. If he could, it would have been done already.

 
at 10:59 PM Anonymous Anonymous said...

I think that some of the managerial moves have been suspect...Conine to bunt with one on and nobody out? You could see Conine extremely ticked off that he was asked to do that after he fouled out.
Another issue is Dunn's great ability to mis-judge balls in left field and also strike out at least 2 times a game. I would not be surprised to see him whiff 300 times this year. He has more career whiffs than hits for goodness sakes. It is time to trade Dunn for whatever we can get. We don't need someone who can hit the ball into the Ohio River in the HR happy ballpark we have now. How about Dunn to the American league to DH and get some pitchers who can pitch, or at least give my 2.5 yr old a shot at it.
I am curious, how many of the Reds HRs have been solo shots? Can't we get anyone on base prior to someone hitting a HR please??

 
at 11:00 PM Anonymous Anonymous said...

I think that some of the managerial moves have been suspect...Conine to bunt with one on and nobody out? You could see Conine extremely ticked off that he was asked to do that after he fouled out.
Another issue is Dunn's great ability to mis-judge balls in left field and also strike out at least 2 times a game. I would not be surprised to see him whiff 300 times this year. He has more career whiffs than hits for goodness sakes. It is time to trade Dunn for whatever we can get. We don't need someone who can hit the ball into the Ohio River in the HR happy ballpark we have now. How about Dunn to the American league to DH and get some pitchers who can pitch, or at least give my 2.5 yr old a shot at it.
I am curious, how many of the Reds HRs have been solo shots? Can't we get anyone on base prior to someone hitting a HR please??

 
at 11:05 PM Anonymous Anonymous said...

Exactly why smallball doesn't work. Everyone loves to talk about how bunting, sac hits, moving the runners over leads to runs. Putting the ball in play is better than striking out. Whatever. Bunting is what either your guys who can't hit (pitchers, defensive specialists) or your good bunting speedy guys do. Conine, Hatteberg, Griffey, Dunn, etc, bunting is NOT their game. Don't have them up there bunting. It wastes their at-bat. I don't want Hatteberg practicing his bunting. I don't want Dunn practicing his bunting.

Interesting comment regarding te majority of sac hits coming from PITCHERS. So, where do Reds position players rank in sac hits compared to the rest of the league. And how many sac bunts do the 4 players have in their entire careers. Seven for someone as tenured as Conine? Hopefully that stat wasn't brought up in defense of Narron. Holy crap.

 
at 11:06 PM Anonymous Anonymous said...

HA! Yeah, it blame Adam Dunn night. Tonight was all his fault.

 
at 11:18 PM Blogger John Fay said...

Conine was ticked because he didn't get the bunt down. I'm with TGO here. Conine has a chance to hit a double and score Phillips from first. I take that chance. Tonight, I may have bunted becasue Hatteberg doesn't hit Marte well.

 
at 11:26 PM Blogger Thomas said...

TGO- Small ball works just fine- ask the Florida Marlins that won the world series a few years ago and the Minnesota Twins every year. Krivsky should know a lot about it, considering he worked in Minnesota for how long? Additionally, how many times would Dunn have to lay down a bunt to the invisible thirdbaseman that is shifted to shortstop before teams stopped using the shift against him? The guy could bat .400 if he laid down a bunt every other time up. Hell, even Barry Bonds (who I despise) does it.

 
at 8:50 AM Anonymous Anonymous said...

The Reds don't know when to bunt or how to bunt. In many cases (like when you're down by 2 in the 9th which happened twice this year) the bunt is uncalled for. Too bad the manager doesn't know it. Apparently he has made up his own stat as well, sacrifice hits. No such thing. A hit is a hit and not a sacrifice. A sac fly is not a hit.

 
at 9:00 AM Anonymous Anonymous said...

I agree with TGO and John and encourage you all to read Moneyball. A bunt is something you do late in the game when you need 1 run, and only if the guy can get it down. Otherwise, a bunt is a waste of an out and one step closer to the end of the inning or game. It has bitten the Reds in the butt too many times this year. Anyone who wants to trade Dunn for nothing in return needs to stop watching baseball and switch to soccer. This is your biggest run producer on a team that can't produce runs. He scores runs, he drives in runs and all the runs count the same, whether they close a deficit, break a tie or put you far ahead.

 
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