On Monday, the Reds put Aroldis Chapman on the 15-day disabled list (well, there’s a big duh) with inflammation in his left shoulder, and replaced him by recalling Jordan Smith. A day later, they optioned third baseman Juan Francisco to AAA Louisville.

Chapman and Francisco, it turns out, were not the problem, as the Reds extended their losing streak to five tonight, getting swept by both the Pittsburgh Pirates and the Cleveland Indians. At least not the whole problem. They also sat Jonny Gomes today to try to get his mohawked head together, but that didn’t do it either.

So what *is* the problem? It appears to be a little of everything. One night the office can’t muster a lousy two runs, the next time the starting pitching can’t muster a lousy two innings. Here’s some bullets for ya:

• Joey “treadmill” Votto – No one beats our reigning MVP when it comes to OBP; dude’s on pace for 128 walks this season (making him a bit of a walk machine, hence the “treadmill” comment). Unfortunately, many people, including one Jonny Gomes, beat his six homers so far this year. While that’s more of a problem for his All-Star chances than an indictment of his contribution, I had to find a way to talk about Votto in this post somehow, and now didn’t seem to be the time to go into detail about his smoldering eyes.
• Bronson “Voice of Experience?” Arroyo – Say what you will about all the other stupid peripheral stuff about Arroyo (cornrows, leg kick, grunge music, supplements, Guitar Hero) the guy eats innings. He’s put away 57 of them in his nine games so far this season, which is good since the bullpen invariably needs a rest by the time his turn comes around. He’s also given up 10 home runs so far this year, which is pretty impressive in the bad way. Though not as noteworthy as the 38 bases on balls surrendered by Edinson Volquez in 51 innings pitched: now that is something special.
• The Future’s So Bright – The good news is that, after leaving the home of the team with the best record in the entirety of the majors, the Reds move on to the home of the team with the second best record in the entirety of the majors (best in the NL, but who’s counting?), so that ought to be a little easier at least.

Less than three weeks to go until Blog Jog 2011, and we’ve just hit the two mile mark in one of our training sessions. Of course, I walked more than I ran of that, but you take your victories where you can get them. Just one more mile to get to full 5k scope.

I’ve done entirely too much talking about this training regimen lately, but on weeks like these, when the team feels the need to counteract its five-game win streak, it’s nice to have something else to talk about for a minute.

If you, too, think this might be a fun diversion (though heaven help us if we’re still needing it in three weeks), you can jog, too. Go to http://reds.com/5k to register for the Redlegs Run, then email [email protected] to say you’ll be at the Blog Jog events before and/or after the run. You have to pay to be in the run, but you don’t have to pay any extra to hang with the blogging community. Cuz that’s just how we roll.