Blog Red Machine » 2011 » September

Within the NL Central

Steve Engbloom — Fri, 30 Sep 2011 17:00:37 +0000

A 2011 view of batting and pitching stats against the NL Central teams. … [visit site to read more]

The Care and Feeding of a Slugger

John Heitz — Fri, 30 Sep 2011 16:46:20 +0000

In the ashes of the 2011 season that fell short of the hopes of Reds fans everywhere, the Reds have highlights to celebrate and promise to embrace. The individual that embodies both promise and achievement is right fielder Jay Bruce. Jay debuted with the Reds 3 and a half years ago at the tender age of 21 and on Tuesday became the 26th player in Cincinnati Reds history to hit 100 home runs. I hear a broad variety of criticism leveled at Jay for everything from an inability to hit breaking balls to being a right handed specialist unable to face left handed pitchers. While there is truth to these statements, they do not paint the full picture.

Jay was drafted in the first round with the 12th pick in the first year player draft on June 10, 2005 fresh out of West Brook High School in Beaumont, Texas at the age of 18. He immediately sat down with the Reds organization and signed his contract a mere 3 days later for a $1.8 million dollar signing bonus and was assigned to the Gulf Coast League to start his professional career where he managed a .270 batting average and 5 home runs in just 37 games before being promoted to the Billings Mustangs, the Reds rookie league affiliate. In an article written by Anthony Castrovince at the time on MLB.com Terry Reynolds, the Reds Director of Amateur Scouting was quoted as saying “The players who aren’t really confident in themselves drag things on and want a lot of guarantees,” Reynolds said. “Here we are, three days after the draft, and he’s ready to go. I think that says all you need to say about him and his family and his desire to be a pro baseball player.” … [visit site to read more]

The Value of Victory

John Heitz — Fri, 30 Sep 2011 02:37:17 +0000

There are a lot of ways to break down the success of a season, or lack thereof. You can look at playoff status, you can compare to the previous year or years, you can compare to your division or league. I am guessing while owners look at each of these factors, the overriding concern is the bottom line. I think it comes down to two questions: Did we make money or at worst, break even? And; Did we invest our money wisely into the product on the field? Given the invisibility of most of the information needed, the first answer can not be answered here. In a cursory way the second answer can addressed by comparing payroll to win production.

A few things to keep in mind, there is a demonstrated correlation between payroll and attendance as you will see. The Reds finished the year with the 10th highest attendance in the National League after starting the year with the 10th highest payroll. Not every team fits this perfectly into the mold, but it is predictive. The saddest example is the Tampa Bay Rays who began with the 31st highest payroll and finished 3oth in attendance in spite of making the playoffs on the last day of the season in arguably the toughest division.

… [visit site to read more]