Cincinnati Reds: How many wins for Jim Riggleman to keep his job?

The Cincinnati Reds are one of the hottest teams in baseball despite being last place in the division. How many wins will the Reds need by season’s end in order for interim manager Jim Riggleman to stay on for next season?

The Cincinnati Reds have been surging of late. They are 4-0-1 in their last 5 series and have won 16 of their last 22 games. Interim manager Jim Riggleman, who took over for the fired Bryan Price after the Reds got off to a 3-15 start, has an above .500 record on the season. How many games do the Reds need to win in order for Riggleman to get the permanent gig next season?

I don’t think that Reds Nation expected this team to turn around under Riggleman’s leadership, but the team has excelled, especially of late. After taking the interim manager position, the Reds promptly lost three straight games to the Cardinals. However, since his first win as the interim manager against Atlanta on April 23rd, Riggleman, and the Reds are 4 games over .500 (35-31).

If the Reds were even a .500 ball club out of the gates instead of losing 15 of their first 18 games, they’d be right in the thick of the Wild Card hunt. In fact, they’d be tied with the Colorado Rockies and only 4.5 games out of the playoffs.

We are past the midway point of the season. The Cincinnati Reds are currently sitting at 38-49 (.437) and 14 games behind the NL Central-leading Milwaukee Brewers. With 75 games left in the season, what’s are realistic expectations for this ball club going forward and how many of those 75 must Riggleman win to stay on board next year?

A lot of that depends on how this team should be evaluated, and how much talent the Reds’ front office trade away before the deadline. Is the last month of the season, in which the Reds went 15-11, enough to convince the Reds to bring Riggleman back? I don’t think so.

Is avoiding 90 losses enough?

I think most Reds fans expected this year’s team to compete. Maybe they weren’t expected to win the National League Central, or even make the playoffs as a Wild Card. But, I think the way the Reds have competed over the last 30 games is about what fans and the front office expected all along.

So, let’s put a number on this. The Reds lost 94 games last season and the season before that. You have to go back to 2014 before you can find a Reds squad that’s avoided a 90 loss season. So let’s start there.

If Cincinnati goes 35-40 over the last 3 months of the season, they’ll finish with a 73-89 record. Is that enough to keep Jim Riggleman around? Eh, I don’t think so.

Will a .500 season keep Riggleman in Cincinnati?

Now we’re getting a little more realistic. If Jim Riggleman and the Redlegs go 43-32 over the final three months of the MLB season, they’ll finish 81-81. While .500 is just okay, Riggleman’s record would be 78-66 (.542). That would be impressive considering where the Reds were when Riggleman took over.

Next: Top 5 Reds second basemen of the last 50 years

To translate that type of record into something tangible, a .542 record would have put the Reds in the playoff last season. I don’t think too many Reds fans would argue with that. I think if Riggleman leads the Reds to more than 40 wins during the remainder of the season, he has a real shot at taking the managerial job permanently.