With the addition of Ken Griffey, Jr. and Dante Bichette, the Reds were expected to overcome any perceived pitching problems by their offense and a strong bullpen. Unfortunately neither the offense nor the bullpen - with the exception of Danny Graves - has come through enough to offset the lack of quality starting pitching. Last year, when the starting pitching failed, Sullivan or Reyes or Williamson - early in the season - would come in and hold the opposition down until the offense could catch up. This year, when the starting pitching fails, the bullpen can't hold the opposition. In the rare times it does, the offense has shown an inability to come back - which I find ironic since the offense was supposed to have been juiced up, along with the ball - this year.
I'm going to divide the team up into 5 areas: Offense, defense, starting pitching, relief pitching, and coaching.
Offense: As I pointed out earlier, the additions of Jr. and Bichette were supposed to supercharge this offense. It didn't work quite as planned. Pokey Reese had a good April and a decent May but June has not been kind to Pokey. He seems to be getting pitched tougher and good breaking pitches seem to render him harmless. He's been dropped down to the 8th position in the order, which seems to be his natural position. Barry Larkin is having a season that defies his age and even though he isn't the SS he used to be, he's still better than most. Barry missed almost a month due to a hand injury he suffered early in the season but hasn't missed a beat since coming back. He is clearly the Reds' most consistent performer. Of course, hitting 2nd ahead of Jr. doesn't hurt either. Jr. had a tough first couple of months. He seemed to want to hit a HR every time up to bat and looked to be pulling everything. His power numbers are at a par with his career averages but his batting average has hovered around the .220's and .230's all year. Jr. hasn't helped himself any by not hustling on balls he feels are sure base hits. In June, Jr. hit over .300 and seems to be using all fields to hit the ball now. He is drawing an amazing number of walks as teams continue to pitch around him. Dante Bichette has not exactly made teams pay for pitching around Jr. His first month was a house of horrors for Dante. He basically couldn't hit water if he fell out of a boat. Teams knew this and they pitched around Jr. to get to Bichette. In the last month or so, Bichette's numbers have increased and he had a great June. Dimitri Young has been the LF for the majority of games this year. Inconsistency has been the name of the game for DY this year. He's not exactly what you call a patient hitter and it has shown in his stats this year. He's not exactly rapping out the doubles, which has seemed to be his trademark over the past few seasons. His lack of speed and power doesn't do much for a team that is 10th in runs scored in the NL. He does give it his all out there, which can't be said about everyone. He has been sharing time in LF with Michael Tucker and Alex Ochoa. Neither one has had consistent enough playing time to evaluate. Both bring speed to the mix but both seem relegated to part time duty. Ochoa missed close to a month with an appendectomy so his playing time has been limited even more. Sean Casey missed a few weeks at the beginning of the season with a hand injury. When he came back, he went through a horrible slump. His average was in the low .200s and his power was non-existent. He has improved his batting average recently but his power numbers have not returned to the level he was at last year. If Sean isn't the slowest player in the league, then he's in the top 5. This doesn't bode well for a team who isn't scoring a lot of runs. This is the second full year in the bigs for Aaron Boone. Technically, it's his first full year since he was in AAA for about a month last year but he played enough last year to have been considered a full time player. If Aaron projects out over the rest of the year, he'll finish with about 25 homers which are pretty decent numbers for a 2nd year player. Aaron's biggest fault at the plate is lack of patience - which seems to be a recurring theme with a lot of the Reds' younger players. He has a tendency to swing at pitches out of the strike zone, especially around eye level. However, he seems to hit those pitches the best. Aaron has good speed but batting with the pitcher behind him doesn't give him a lot of opportunity to use it. Eddie Taubensee is known as a player with a good stick. The Reds were counting on Eddie's power, average and the ability to drive in runs to make this a successful team. Unfortunately, he hasn't delivered in any of those areas. In fact, he has floundered so much that his backup, Benito Santiago, has received the bulk of the playing time as of late. Benito has come up with some key hits this year and seems to be recovered from his automobile accident, which has hampered him the past couple of years. He hit well when inserted into the lineup on a regular basis but has tailed off as of late. A couple of players who haven't received a lot of playing time are Hal Morris and Chris Stynes. Morris' job is to come off the bench and pinch hit against mostly right-handed pitchers. As a pinch hitter, Morris has performed well. He's not going to give you a great deal of power but is adequate as a pinch hitter. Last year, at this time, a great deal of Reds' fans seemed to think that Chris Stynes should be released since he was hitting so poorly in limited play. What a difference a year - not to mention a week - makes. Chris has hit over .400 this year and due to some injuries, he has gotten the chance to play regularly and lead off. Chris hit homers in four straight games last week and had a five hit day last Saturday. He seems to have an idea on how to hit at the top of the order. Juan Castro filled in for Larkin after Barry's injury and Gookie Dawkins couldn't cut the mustard offensively. Castro came with a reputation as a guy with a great glove and a lousy stick. The glove part was as advertised but he hit well in Larkin's absence. D.T. Cromer had two stints in the bigs this year. He was on the Opening Day roster filling in for an injured Sean Casey. D.T. did nothing but hit when he was up here the first time. He hit so well he earned regular playing time until Casey came back. He hit so well in Louisville, after he was sent down, that he was brought back up after an injury to a pitcher. Since 3 left-handed hitting first basemen were on the roster, D.T.'s playing time was regulated to pinch-hitting and didn't get any hits in his second stint. He seems like a good hitter who needs playing time to find out whether he'll sink or swim in the majors.
Defense: I'll start off here where I ended on offense: the catching. Without his hitting, Taubensee is less of an asset to the Reds. He is erratic - to say the least - at throwing out baserunners, although a good deal of the blame must be placed on the pitchers' ability to hold runners on. There have been questions raised about his ability to handle a pitching staff, but with this pitching staff he could be Johnny Bench back there and it wouldn't matter. Last year Taubensee showed improvement in blocking pitches in the dirt. This year it hasn't shown due mainly to the league leading wild pitch total of the Reds' staff. Santiago has been a dream defensively, although his ability to block balls in the dirt has been a question mark. He still has a gun for an arm and on occasion will try to pick a runner off from his knees. He is Osvaldo Fernandez' personal catcher due to the fact that Fernandez still has problems with the English language. He has made some superb plays on tagging runners out heading for home. Heading over to 3rd base, Aaron Boone has been nothing short of terrific defensively. He may not be in the caliber of Robin Ventura or Chipper Jones defensively but give him time and he'll be among the elite. At SS, Larkin has perhaps lost a step and his arm isn't as strong as it used to be but he'll more than likely win the Gold Glove at SS this year. Juan Castro, Gookie Dawkins and Reese may all be better defensively but none of them is the whole package like Larkin is. Pokey Reese has slipped defensively, in my opinion, but he is still one of the best fielding 2nd basemen in the majors. His arm is second to none and he plays deep enough that he can go into short right field to get to bloopers out there. As a double play combo, he and Larkin work very well together. Sean Casey will probably never win any Gold Gloves and his range is less than great. He isn't a defensive liability and he handles the toss to the pitcher and the throw to second well. Dimitri Young isn't a natural LF. God love him, he probably works as hard as anyone to be an adequate LF. But the fact is he cannot get to balls a Michael Tucker or an Alex Ochoa can. LF isn't a position where you put your strongest OF defensively anyway. Balls in the corner will be a double anyway unless the LF falls on his can. Tucker and Ochoa will play both RF and LF and neither one will hurt you out there. Ochoa has a very strong arm and can cut down a runner taking an extra base. In CF, Jr. has few peers. If the ball stays in the park, more than likely, Jr. will catch it. He gives maximum effort out there and while he may not have the strongest arm in the world, he can still put fear into baserunners. Jr. sometimes tries to do too much out there and will occasionally miss a cutoff man or make a wild throw to 3rd. During the first part of the year, Dante had a tough time in RF. His big problem was with balls hit in the RF corner. He still has some trouble with that play but has improved. Even though he's not fast, he'll get to almost every ball hit in his range on the fly. His arm is terrific and he's cut down or held several runners who were thinking they could take the extra base on him. Dante also has Pokey to help him out in short RF. Juan Castro is the primary backup at short, 2nd and 3rd and has been stellar when he has had the chance to play. Hal Morris is a better defensive 1st baseman than Sean Casey. However, 1st isn't the place where you put the best defenders at. It's nice to have someone at 1st who can give you a good glove but it's not a necessity. Chris Stynes has filled in at 3rd, 2nd, RF and LF. His natural position is 2nd and he's going to suffer in comparison - defensively - to Pokey. He may not have a strong enough arm for 3rd but it isn't the weakest I've seen. He's also a good fill in in the OF.