Earlier this week, MLB announced the winner of the National League’s Most Valuable Player award. We all knew that Joey Votto would not be repeating for the Cincinnati Reds, thanks to their craptastic year. But we all wondered where he would place and how many votes he’d get.

As expected, the Milwaukee Brewers’ Ryan Braun won the award. And Votto placed sixth.

1. Ryan Braun, Milwaukee -388
2. Matt Kemp, L.A. Dodgers -332
3. Prince Fielder, Milwaukee -229
4. Justin Upton, Arizona1-214
5. Albert Pujols, St. Louis–166
6. Joey Votto, Cincinnati–135
7. Lance Berkman, St. Louis–118
8. Troy Tulowitzki, Colorado—69
9. Roy Halladay, Philadelphia–52
10. Ryan Howard, Philadelphia—39
11. Jose Reyes, N.Y. Mets—31
12. Clayton Kershaw, L.A. Dodgers–29
13. Shane Victorino, Philadelphia—18
14. Ian Kennedy, Arizona—16
15. Cliff Lee, Philadelphia—12
16. Hunter Pence, Houston-Phi.—10
17. Pablo Sandoval, San Francisco—7
18. John Axford, Milwaukee—7
19. Michael Morse, Washington—5
20. Carlos Beltran, N.Y. Mets-S.F.—3
21. Miguel Montero, Arizona—2
22. Yadier Molina, St. Louis—2
23. Starlin Castro, Chicago—1
24. Craig Kimbrel, Atlanta—1
25. Carlos Ruiz, Philadelphia—1
26. Mike Stanton, Florida—1

Votto was on a majority of the ballots, and I might quibble with him finishing lower than Prince Fielder–who is grossly overrated, in my opinion–but it’s still nice to see him getting some love. He’s very, very good, and I’m going to enjoy his time as a Red as long as it lasts. In fact, I’m sure I’ll be wearing my Votto jersey this weekend at RedsFest.

The St. Louis Cardinals, as many of you know, made it past the Philadelphia Phillies, despite being an inferior club. My feelings on this are largely frustration at the missed opportunity by the Cincinnati Reds and embarrassment by the General Manager who refused to do anything. The Reds should have done what the Cardinals did, and that sucks.

But this next playoff series is clear. The good guys are the Brewers, and the bad guys are the Cardinals. And the Brewers dislike the Cardinals as much as the Reds do.

Speaking to reporters at Miller Park on Saturday, [Zack] Greinke said some of his Brewers teammates don’t like Cardinals ace Chris Carpenter when he shouts at batters from the mound.

“They think his presence, his attitude out there sometimes is like a phony attitude,” Greinke said. “And then he yells at people. He just stares people down and stuff. And most pitchers just don’t do that. And when guys do, I guess some hitters get mad. Some hitters do it to pitchers. But when you do that some people will get mad.

“There’s other pitchers in the league that do it, but, I don’t know,” Greinke said, “a lot of guys on our team don’t like Carpenter.”

Amen. And for a primer on the dislike between the two clubs and the whining the Brewers have received from the Cardinals, I recommend this primer.

From complaints of scoreboards in the stadium to benches emptying altercations, there’s some similarity between the Brewers-Cardinals this year and the Reds-Cardinals last year. Given that there’s only one constant, it makes it easy to root for the Brewers to knock out the Cardinals.

Boxscore

Saturday night’s game between the Cincinnati Reds and the Milwaukee Brewers was unfortunately a bit of a snoozer. The Reds lost 10-1, with the only offense being a solo shot from Yonder Alonso.

The game was fun, though, despite that, with some great tweeting going on via all the Reds Tweetup guests. You can view the tweets here.

Before the event was also the unveiling of the new Johnny Bench statue. Bench spoke to the crowd before the game.

After that, Edinson Volquez took to the mound. He started well, but was probably left in too long and fell apart in the 7th. (No thanks to his bullpen, who allowed all inherited runners to score.)

The Reds’ batters had no luck either, aside from Alonso. The heart of the lineup was quiet, with Joey Votto and Jay Bruce combining for zero hits.

Yovani Gallardo was on his game for the Brewers, and the game was effectively over when Volquez and the bullpen imploded.

Volquez got the loss and Gallardo took the victory. It was a far cry from last September’s Tweetup, when the Reds clinched the division. And from the last Johnny Bench night, when Bench homered to lead the Reds to a win. Sadly, there were no fireworks from Reds catchers tonight.

Still, it was a fun event, and I’m looking forward to next year’s.

Over the 2011 Memorial Day weekend, we visited Wisconsin for a Milwaukee Brewers game. Of course, there was a sausage race.

And what better time to share the video than during the 2011 All Star game?

The winning sausage prompted our son to grab as many items pertaining to that sausage from the gift shop as he could find, including a fridge magnet and a t-shirt. I think he’s still a Cincinnati Reds fan, though.

Over Memorial Day weekend, we took a family trip up to Milwaukee for our first visit to Miller Park. You can see a panoramic shot from our upper deck seats above. We didn’t explore the park much. Thanks to a weekend lugging around our 10 year-old and his cousin, we were a bit exhausted.

The park was nice, but it left me feeling the same way as I did at the Houston Astros’ Minute Maid Park: oddly disconcerted. I can’t exactly put my finger on it, but something feels off. I’m guessing it’s that the stadiums are built with retractable roofs, and thus are fully enclosed. It doesn’t feel right to play baseball indoors.

I do look forward to going back sometime, though. Next time, maybe we’ll be resting at the hotel instead of during the baseball game.

Boxscore

Well, it’s nice to see that the Cincinnati Reds can still take a series from the Milwaukee Brewers.

This time, the win wasn’t nearly so dominating, requiring late-game heroics from Joey Votto and Jay Bruce. But they came through, each with their own 2-run homer. Votto’s was the one that gave them the lead.

And then Francisco Cordero came on for his 300th career save.

The game started off shakily, with starter Mike Leake giving up yet another home run to start the game. That makes it sound like it’s been Leake doing all of that for the Reds this year, but I know Volquez has done that at least twice. That first inning continues to be a problem.

But the offense came back and the Reds have some hope as they enter their first off-day in 20 days. And I grouse a bit when I have to work late every so often. At least I get weekends off.

The RHM clan headed to Milwaukee, WI this Memorial Day weekend for some fun. We stopped at a Milwaukee Brewers game for our first visit to Miller Park.

The place is very nice, and the tailgating experience is unique. More details wil l come, including a panoramic photo of the park. For now, here’s the view as we approached from the parking lot.

No, he’s not a Pokemon, but Cincinnati Reds fireballer Aroldis Chapman seems to add to his move set the more battles he’s victorious in.

Remember back to Saturday when the Reds beat the St. Louis Cardinals? Chapman got the win in that affair, shutting down the Cardinals in the 7th inning.

Yesterday, Chapman did it again, this time against the Milwaukee Brewers. He was brought in in the bottom of the 8th in a tie game with runners on first and second. He promptly hit the first batter he faced to load them, but after that, the Brewers didn’t have a chance. He struck out Carlos Gomez and then got Ryan Braun to ground weakly to third for the final out.

But he wasn’t done. The game was still tied heading into the bottom of the 9th, so rather than use his closer, Dusty Baker sent Chapman back out. Again, the Brewers didn’t have a chance. He made Prince Fielder look silly, striking him out, got a fly-out from Casey McGehee, and then picked off the one runner he did allow to reach. Oh, and all of this with his fastball consistently north of 100 miles per hour. John Fay described it as Chapman’s best game so far.

Chapman threw 19 pitches, 17 strikes.

“That was the best he’s looked,” Baker said. “He was throwing quality strikes and getting quality hitters out. … They got guys over there who can hit in the clutch.”

Obviously the guy would be more valuable in the starting rotation, but he sure is a nice option to have right now. And until then, he might just be making Baker a better, smarter manager.

Let’s hope he he’s not reached level 100 yet. I’d hate to see him maxed out so early.

Boxscore

Ah, at last: a Reds game without a rain delay. Sometimes that dome really pays off.

Tonight Bronson Arroyo took the mound for the Reds and put in a really good showing, giving up just 2 runs (1 earned) on 6 hits and two bases on balls through 6 and a third innings. Logan Ondrusek, Bill Bray, Nick Massett and Jordan Smith filled in the rest of the innings and gave up another three runs among them, but that’s OK when your offense has put together a six-run third.

From the offense, Dusty Baker changed the line-up to shake it up, to excellent results. Brandon Phillips knocked in three of the team’s six from the clean-up spot. Jay Bruce and Ryan Hannigan each contributed two more RBI from the two hole and seven hole respectively. Jonny Gomes and Arroyo filled out the rest of the RBI story.

Of course, it wouldn’t be a game wrap on Red Hot Mama without a mention of Joey “minor obsession” Votto: he went 1-for-5 to pull his average down to .383 but extend his on-base streak to something unholy like 40 games or something.

Tomorrow the Reds continue the series with the Brewers tomorrow in Milwaukee at 8:10 p.m. Mike Leake will take on Marco Estrada.

Thank you, Milwaukee Brewers for also losing so as to offset the 2011 debut of Badroyo and keep the Reds in a one-game lead for first place in the division. I hope we can do it again sometime.

Of course, we the way we “do it again” is by both teams continuing to lose, we’ll have to start worrying about the Chicago Cubs. And, by extension, the end of the world.