Reds Can't Gain Ground on Cards
94 games played, 68 to go, if my math is correct because I'm not good with numbers, and the Reds just can't gain any ground on the St. Louis Cardinals. I'm all for a close race, but I would rather see the Reds win the division my 10 games then by 1. I guess in the end whether it's 1 game or 10, as long as they win the division and make the playoffs, it's enough for me. Their is more drama in a close race, Hell Detroit and Minnesota had to play 163 games last year before a winner could be declared. The thing is I not only want the Reds to win, but I want them to kick the crap out of everyone in the process.
Some people like a close race, but I prefer a blow out. I would rather see the Bengals win by four touchdowns than a last second field goal. Don't get me wrong last year when the Bengals won some of their games on the last drive it was very compelling stuff. Entertaining to say the least, but after a while it tears your gut out watching your favorite team win the game on the final play. I feel a lot better when my team has a large lead going into the 9th inning or the 4th quarter. Good teams win a game at the very end and find a different way to win every game. Great teams win games by simply being better than their opponent in every facet of the game and that's what I want to see from my Reds the rest of the season.
With every Reds win the first thought that comes to mind is, I wonder what the Cardinals did? If they won too, its a wash and you have to wait another day to gain some ground or catch up. If they lost then, you say, now we have an even bigger lead or we are that much closer to them. I keep waiting for the Reds to pull away or to fall apart, but neither has happened. When the Reds are hot the Cardinals are hot too, well at least lukewarm. When the Reds are cold, so are the Cardinals. It's like when one team wins four in a row, the other wins four in a row the next week. I don't know about you, but that's starting to get annoying. It would not surprise me at all if the race in the NL Central goes down to the last game of the year. Compelling, but would also give me a heart attack if the Reds miss the playoffs by one game on the last day of the season.
I bleed Red, no joke, and like a true fan I want my team to beat the living pulp out of everyone they play. Not only do I want the Reds to win the World Series I want them to go down as one of the greatest teams in the history of baseball. When you look at some of the greatest teams in baseball, they did not just barely get by their opponents, they flat out smoked them. Let's look at three examples.
First off, arguably the best team in the history of baseball, the 1927 "Murder's Row" Yankees. The 1927 Yankees finished 110-44, a winning percentage of .714 and scored 975 runs while allowing only 599. They won the league by 18.5 games and had a run differential of 376. If that wasn't enough Lou Gehrig hit .373, and hit 47 HR and drove in 175 runs. Batting with Gehrig was none other than Babe Ruth who chipped in with 60 HR, 164 RBI, while batting .356. Hence the term Murder's Row. Facing Ruth and Gehrig back-to-back must have been like a living nightmare for pitchers.
The 1927 Yankees kicked the crap out of everyone they played and swept the World Series in four games. Grant it, the year was 1927, but still that's pretty impressive. The best stat however, was that the salary for the Babe that year was a lucrative $70,000. He was the highest paid player on the Yankees and if you compare that to today's highest paid player on the Yankees, A-Rod, it's quite a difference. A-Rod makes $33,000,000 this year, that's $207,703 a game. Babe Ruth made $454.54 a game. Just a little bit of a difference. And Gehrig only made $8,000 in 1927 on top of that. Some inflation since then perhaps?
The Big Red Machine teams of 1975 and 1976 are also considered one of the greatest teams in baseball history and like the 1927 Yankees the were above and beyond everyone else. The 1975 Reds were 108-54, .667 winning percentage, won the division by 20 games, had a run differential of 254 and won one of the most exciting World Series ever against the Boston Red Sox in 7 games. Future Hall a Famers, Joe Morgan, Johnny Bench and Tony Perez lead the way. Morgan batted .317, stole 67 bases and scored 107 runs. Perez batted .282, hit 20 HR and drove in 109 runs. While Bench batted .283, hit 28 HR and drove in 110 runs. Not to mention every starter in the rotation, 6 of them, won at least 10 games. Pretty damn good, hard to believe that they could play any better, well they did.
The 1976 Reds, my favorite team of all-time was even better than the team in 1975 and I would love to see them take on the 1927 New York Yankees in a seven game series. Let's see who wins that. A lot better than the baseball being shown on ESPN. The 1976 Big Red Machine was even better than the 1975 team, even though they won only 102 games and lead everyone by 10 games, like that's not a lot. A run differential of 234 runs, with future Hall of Famers Joe Morgan and George Foster leading the way, along with should be Hall of Famer Pete Rose, the '76 Reds went undefeated in the postseason sweeping the Phillies and sweeping a very good Yankees team in the World Series. I never saw the Big Red Machine play, because I wasn't born yet, but Reds fans always say that the '76 team was the better of the two. I could go on about the 1990 Reds, who went wire-to-wire and were in first place for 162 games and won the World Series in four games, but hopefully you get my point.
The Reds still have 68 more games to be played and I doubt they will go on as one of the greatest teams to ever be assembled, but it sure would be nice if the just made the playoffs. I still think that 2011 will be their year and who knows, maybe in the near future the Reds will be the best teams in baseball. And maybe even go down as one of the greatest teams in the history of the great sport of baseball, even greater than the old Big Red Machine.
"Who-Dey Reds"
Seems like all the great ones end with a saying or catch phrase that makes them unique. Since I like the Reds and Bengals I decided to put two and two together and now I have a signature phrase, well at least I like it. It's also the name of my fantasy baseball team, but would rather not talk about how that's going.
Bonus: I'm now 5-0 at Reds games this year and just another reason why I need season tickets. Then the Reds would win at least 81 games every year. Hope the streak continues when I go to the game on Wednesday as the Reds take on rookie phenom Stephen Strasburg and the Washington Nationals. I hear he is pretty good, but not like he gets a lot of coverage or anything like that on ESPN. Hell, I'm surprise they don't have a Strasburg Show the day he is scheduled to pitch. It could just as compelling as the LeBron special. I love the media. Go Reds.
Some people like a close race, but I prefer a blow out. I would rather see the Bengals win by four touchdowns than a last second field goal. Don't get me wrong last year when the Bengals won some of their games on the last drive it was very compelling stuff. Entertaining to say the least, but after a while it tears your gut out watching your favorite team win the game on the final play. I feel a lot better when my team has a large lead going into the 9th inning or the 4th quarter. Good teams win a game at the very end and find a different way to win every game. Great teams win games by simply being better than their opponent in every facet of the game and that's what I want to see from my Reds the rest of the season.
With every Reds win the first thought that comes to mind is, I wonder what the Cardinals did? If they won too, its a wash and you have to wait another day to gain some ground or catch up. If they lost then, you say, now we have an even bigger lead or we are that much closer to them. I keep waiting for the Reds to pull away or to fall apart, but neither has happened. When the Reds are hot the Cardinals are hot too, well at least lukewarm. When the Reds are cold, so are the Cardinals. It's like when one team wins four in a row, the other wins four in a row the next week. I don't know about you, but that's starting to get annoying. It would not surprise me at all if the race in the NL Central goes down to the last game of the year. Compelling, but would also give me a heart attack if the Reds miss the playoffs by one game on the last day of the season.
I bleed Red, no joke, and like a true fan I want my team to beat the living pulp out of everyone they play. Not only do I want the Reds to win the World Series I want them to go down as one of the greatest teams in the history of baseball. When you look at some of the greatest teams in baseball, they did not just barely get by their opponents, they flat out smoked them. Let's look at three examples.
First off, arguably the best team in the history of baseball, the 1927 "Murder's Row" Yankees. The 1927 Yankees finished 110-44, a winning percentage of .714 and scored 975 runs while allowing only 599. They won the league by 18.5 games and had a run differential of 376. If that wasn't enough Lou Gehrig hit .373, and hit 47 HR and drove in 175 runs. Batting with Gehrig was none other than Babe Ruth who chipped in with 60 HR, 164 RBI, while batting .356. Hence the term Murder's Row. Facing Ruth and Gehrig back-to-back must have been like a living nightmare for pitchers.
The 1927 Yankees kicked the crap out of everyone they played and swept the World Series in four games. Grant it, the year was 1927, but still that's pretty impressive. The best stat however, was that the salary for the Babe that year was a lucrative $70,000. He was the highest paid player on the Yankees and if you compare that to today's highest paid player on the Yankees, A-Rod, it's quite a difference. A-Rod makes $33,000,000 this year, that's $207,703 a game. Babe Ruth made $454.54 a game. Just a little bit of a difference. And Gehrig only made $8,000 in 1927 on top of that. Some inflation since then perhaps?
The Big Red Machine teams of 1975 and 1976 are also considered one of the greatest teams in baseball history and like the 1927 Yankees the were above and beyond everyone else. The 1975 Reds were 108-54, .667 winning percentage, won the division by 20 games, had a run differential of 254 and won one of the most exciting World Series ever against the Boston Red Sox in 7 games. Future Hall a Famers, Joe Morgan, Johnny Bench and Tony Perez lead the way. Morgan batted .317, stole 67 bases and scored 107 runs. Perez batted .282, hit 20 HR and drove in 109 runs. While Bench batted .283, hit 28 HR and drove in 110 runs. Not to mention every starter in the rotation, 6 of them, won at least 10 games. Pretty damn good, hard to believe that they could play any better, well they did.
The 1976 Reds, my favorite team of all-time was even better than the team in 1975 and I would love to see them take on the 1927 New York Yankees in a seven game series. Let's see who wins that. A lot better than the baseball being shown on ESPN. The 1976 Big Red Machine was even better than the 1975 team, even though they won only 102 games and lead everyone by 10 games, like that's not a lot. A run differential of 234 runs, with future Hall of Famers Joe Morgan and George Foster leading the way, along with should be Hall of Famer Pete Rose, the '76 Reds went undefeated in the postseason sweeping the Phillies and sweeping a very good Yankees team in the World Series. I never saw the Big Red Machine play, because I wasn't born yet, but Reds fans always say that the '76 team was the better of the two. I could go on about the 1990 Reds, who went wire-to-wire and were in first place for 162 games and won the World Series in four games, but hopefully you get my point.
The Reds still have 68 more games to be played and I doubt they will go on as one of the greatest teams to ever be assembled, but it sure would be nice if the just made the playoffs. I still think that 2011 will be their year and who knows, maybe in the near future the Reds will be the best teams in baseball. And maybe even go down as one of the greatest teams in the history of the great sport of baseball, even greater than the old Big Red Machine.
"Who-Dey Reds"
Seems like all the great ones end with a saying or catch phrase that makes them unique. Since I like the Reds and Bengals I decided to put two and two together and now I have a signature phrase, well at least I like it. It's also the name of my fantasy baseball team, but would rather not talk about how that's going.
Bonus: I'm now 5-0 at Reds games this year and just another reason why I need season tickets. Then the Reds would win at least 81 games every year. Hope the streak continues when I go to the game on Wednesday as the Reds take on rookie phenom Stephen Strasburg and the Washington Nationals. I hear he is pretty good, but not like he gets a lot of coverage or anything like that on ESPN. Hell, I'm surprise they don't have a Strasburg Show the day he is scheduled to pitch. It could just as compelling as the LeBron special. I love the media. Go Reds.
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