Cincinnati Reds backup shortstop Edgar Renteria has not had what you would call a good 2011. His batting average is .219, he gets on only 30% of the time, and his slugging is at .246. Between him and starter Paul Janish, the Reds are sporting one of the worst shortstop tandems in all of baseball.

The Internets have a solution, though: Free Zach Cozart.

Cozart plays shortstop for the AAA Louisville Bats, and he’s been doing well. In contrast to Renteria and Janish, Cozart seems to be able to actually hit. So far this year, he’s batting .318, getting on base 36% of the time, and has a slugging percentage of .496. His defense seems solid, too.

These facts have people clamoring for the release of Renteria and the call-up of Cozart. And it does make a certain amount of sense. The team has been getting no offense from the shortstop. In my opinion, great defense is an excuse for no offense at that position, but when there’s an alternative, there is logic in trying it.

Reds beat writer John Fay talked to general manager Walt Jocketty about it.

I asked Walt Jocketty Saturday if Cozart’s play was about to force the issue. “We’re not at that point yet,” he said.

Jocketty has always been a patient GM. But with the .500 ball the Reds have been playing all year–in no small part to a hit or miss offense–I hope he doesn’t miss “that point” before it’s too late.

The Reds lost to the Blue Jays tonight, and it was a game they probably should have won, but not to the degree that the Cardinals should win tonight. And even so, as of this writing, the Cards are down by one. Go Royals! I guess!

If the fine folks in Kansas City can help the Reds not to slip into anymore distant a third place, I’m sure we’d all appreciate it. Meanwhile, the NLC’s first place Brewers have drawn the Red Sox for this round of interleague play. That’s totally fair.

Of course, with this interleague play, you pretty much never know what you’re going to get (except in the case of the aforementioned Cardinals, who’s “rival” is the Charlie Brown of the MLB). Case-in-point, the Pirates, who, in their first non-abysmal year in recent memory have matched up against the also-non-abysmal Indians. I heard it’s the first time the two teams have played each other when both teams were over .500. Will wonders never cease?

Meanwhile, Sports Illustrated has published this year’s list of the mostly highly paid American Athletes, called the Fortunate 50. With one player in the top 10 and only 15 in the whole 50 (and obviously not a Red among them), it seems like baseball players are underpaid (or more rationally paid, depending on your point of view), compared to other sports, especially football. But since playing football apparently also makes you insane and shortens your life significantly, maybe it’s really just a form of hazard pay.

Get some sleep, everyone. Interleague play continue tomorrow. With the Pirates on the roll they’re on, the Reds need to take this one just to keep third place to themselves. Seriously, you just never know what you’re going to get.

It’s so strange having the Reds in the race but not in the lead. As of a moment ago, the Cubs beat the Brewers, pushing Milwaukee back into a tie for first place with the Cardinals, who are currently on a four-game losing streak. I knew they were playing over their heads, but they don’t actually have to fall back to earth all at once.

All this puts our Cincinnati Reds in third place in the division and three games behind on the leaders while being tied 1-1 after the fifth inning. I knew this team was playing below their ability, but making it up all at once would be just fine by me.

Joey Votto Figurine
Continuing the theme lately of late-night rambling…

The good people at the Blog Jog were kind enough to share a Joey Votto figurine when we were in town this weekend. It’s a nice figurine, but there has never been a spandex-clad superhero with a costume as tight as this. I’m not saying that this isn’t an accurate depiction of Joey Votto’s ass; I’m just saying they might have left a little to the imagination.

Link Request Backlog
The lengthy list of link requests in my inbox is growing shorter, and today I’m knocking of two at once: GameJ Baseball (www.PlayUpBaseball.com) and GameSlam (www.gameslam.com/) are both sites where you can predict the action in real-time games to compete against other fans, and probably win actual prizes. I can’t say I’ve tried it myself, what with hardly having time to watch games, let alone guess what’s going to happen next, but if you try it and it’s fun, let everyone know in the comments.

Your Cincinnati Reds, just four games back on the Brewers (?) are on the field even as I write this trying to improve their record against the LA Dodgers. It’s going OK so far. It was looking like we had Bad-royo on the mound for a minute there, but in the top of the fifth the Dodgers have only scored two. That shortstop of theirs has kept the Reds to just one, but seeing as its the top of the inning and, for some reason, I am still awake, I’m hopeful that this is going to be the time to see that number grow.

Johnny Cueto goes tomorrow, which is always a good show. I surely won’t mind when it’s a good show in my own timezone, though. The weather has even been nice ’round these parts the last few days.

This post won’t be exclusively exhausted late-night babbling: in the continuing effort of being aware of what’s going on in the Reds blogging community, tonight I bring to you Baseball on Twitter. It’s sort of like a Twitter app but for your desktop, and it saves you the effort of running your own Reds Twitter search when you’re following the game. It’s worth checking out to see the up-to-the-minute Reds conversation. Give it a look and let me know what you think.

Taking part in the Blog Jog and spending time with my fellow bloggers, like Brian from Chris Sabo’s Goggles, Dan from OMGreds, and Jamie from Better Off Red, I realized several important things, including:

• I am a slow-ass runner.
• I don’t give nearly as much attention to uniforms as some of these guys do.
• None of the guys I talked to were the same guys I used to talk to back when RHM started up in 2005.

And maybe most importantly:

• I have neglected my responsibility to participate in the blogging community for long enough.

So, effective immediately, we here at RHM are making a concerted effort to be a better blogging citizen. Maybe, if I keep it up, I’ll finally even review that book I received in 2009.

With that in mind, here’s a link to a Reds mash-up site you might be interested in: check out Chat Reds and let me know what you think.