Last Game
The Reds were unable to sweep the Milwaukee Brewers on Wednesday, taking a shellacking and losing 13-1 instead. The lone Reds run was driven in by Jonny Gomes. Johnny Cueto had his worst outing of the year, if not his career, and took the loss by allowing 8 runs in 1 1/3 innings.
Next Game
After a day off for travel yesterday, the Reds open a three-game series against the San Diego Padres tonight. This is the last contending team the Reds will play before the post-season and has all kinds of playoff overtones, with the Padres half a game back in both the West and the wild card. Plus, the Reds continue to want to improve their record and get some home-field advantage for at least the first round of the playoffs. Bronson Arroyo will take on Chris Young tonight at 10:05 EDT.
Fire Joe Morgan Day at Deadspin
I somehow missed this the day it was going on, but Deadspin got the FireJoeMorgan gang together again for just one day earlier this week. As expected, there was a post about Mr. Morgan. This one takes on the weird scene described in a sports article last month about Mike Leake slapping Joe Morgan’s naked ass in the clubhouse. The FJM guys apparently thought that was weird. You definitely don’t want to miss the “actual transcript of a real thing that definitely happened in a real game recently” at the end of the post.
They also did a brief dissection of one of Morgan’s ESPN online chats, taking exception to his claiming that there was no debate in who should win the American League Cy Young Award: Felix Hernandez or C. C. Sabathia. Morgan included this little gem.
I don’t buy into the point that if Felix is pitching for someone else he’d have more wins.
This leads FJM into one of the better arguments I’ve read as to why starting pitchers should never be measured by wins.
Felix has thrown more innings than Sabathia. And his job is not to win the game. His job is to help the defense prevent the other team from winning, which he has done better than anyone. The job of winning the game comes from the offense, which is about to set a 40-year low-water mark.
The Reds-related ones are entertaining, but all of the others are as well, especially the tearing apart of the cliche article about David Eckstein getting so much out of his talents. What is it sportswriters love so much about scrappy white guys?
What to Say to Sound Smart at the Water Cooler
With 86 wins, the Reds have their highest win total since 1999, when they went 96-67. The Reds cannot better that this year because only 9 games remain in the season.