This past Wednesday, Carlos Gomez hit for the cycle and Joey Votto hit three home runs. On SportsCenter’s Top Plays, Votto’s performance ranked 10th while Gomez’s performance ranked 4th. That got me thinking. How do they rank their top plays? Obviously, Gomez’s feat was rarer, but hitting three home runs is more valuable than hitting for the cycle.

What about when you put it in the context of their games? Votto’s first home run came in a scoreless game to lead off the bottom of the second. He led off the third with a walk and stole second, but the score was already 5-0. After Brandon Phillips led off the fifth with a homer to make it 6-0, Votto hit his second home run. Then in the sixth with two outs and Phillips on first, Votto hit his third to make it 9-0. He would later ground out to short to lead off the eighth. Since the first home run came in a scoreless game, it obviously impacted the game. In his next plate appearance, the score was already 5-0, so his performance from that point on had little impact on the outcome of the game.

In Gomez’s case, he homered to lead off the game. He struck out for the second out in the third inning of a 1-0 game. He next came to the plate with two outs and a runner on second in the fifth, and subsequently drove in the second run of the game. In the next inning, Gomez would again come to the plate with a runner on second and two outs. He responded with an RBI double to center to make it 7-0. He would later single to lead off the ninth to complete the cycle. His last two ABs came with six- and seven-run leads, but his home run and triple greatly impacted the game.

By placing their performances in the context of their games, it can be seen that Carlos Gomez had a much greater impact on the Twins’ victory than Joey Votto had on the Reds’ victory. Based on this, I decided that I’d start to post the top ten most important plays of the week. I chose the top ten plays using Win Probability Added, which is the change in win expectancy during the play. Without further ado:

1. Mike Lamb 2-R Walk-off 1B in the 9th
2. Rickie Weeks 2-R Walk-off 1B in the 9th
3. David Dellucci 3-R HR in the 8th
4. Chris Iannetta 2-R 3B in the 8th
5. Carlos Lee 2-R 2B in the 8th (2:30 into video)
6. Mark Ellis Walk-off HR in the 10th
7. Pablo Ozuna Bases Loaded Game-Ending GIDP in the 9th
8. Steve Holm 2-R HR in the 7th (first career HR)
9. Carl Crawford 3-R HR in the 6th
10. Ryan Ludwick 2-R 1B in the 9th

A couple of things to note:

1. All but the DP came with two outs in the inning.
2. Only a couple of the top ten plays occurred prior to the 8th inning.

Thanks to Fan Graphs for the WPA stats and thanks to MLB.com for the links to the videos.

Joe Sheehan of Baseball Prospectus wrote “The Teflon Manager” Sunday about how Dusty Baker is “ill-suited to his personnel.” I couldn’t agree more. As a former Reds’ fan surrounded by actual Reds’ fans, I couldn’t help but laugh when they hired Dusty Baker. The Reds have four of the top 41 prospects in baseball, and all four will see time in the major leagues this year. Baker has a predilection for veterans at the expense of their more talented but unproven challengers. He also has been blamed for the demise of Kerry Wood and Mark Prior. Neither of these can be good for the development of Jay Bruce, Homer Bailey, Joey Votto, or Johnny Cueto.

We’ll start with Joey Votto, who is a major subject in this blog and its comments. Baker wants Votto to become more aggressive than the take-and-rake approach that has made him the 21st prospect in baseball. Some people, such as an anonymous posted on the above blog, agree with this philosophy because “I'll take 50 walks and 200 hits over 150 hits and 100 walks any day.” I don’t think you’ll find anyone that disagrees with that statement. The problem is when you take a guy that gets 150 hits and 100 walks and try to turn him into a guy with 200 hits and 50 walks, you’ll probably end up with a guy that gets 160-170 hits and 50-60 walks. I’m not saying that Votto would get 150 hits and 100 walks, but the logic still stands. Dusty, please leave Votto alone. His approach has gotten him this far, and he’ll be better without your “help.”

With the two pitchers Bailey and Cueto, the worry is that Baker hasn’t learned his lesson from Wood and Prior. Only time will tell. As Nate Silver put it, “If the careers of Bailey and Cueto are ruined by high pitch counts, it will be Dusty who pulled the trigger–but the Reds who hired the assassin.”

When it comes to the top prospect in baseball Jay Bruce, Baker is so worried about having a leadoff hitter in the lineup that he’s ignoring the first step in making out a lineup: get the top 8 players out on the field. Jay Bruce split his time over three levels in 2007. He hit .325/.379/.586, .333/.405/.652, and .305/.358/.567 at High-A, AA, and AAA. The Reds kept challenging him by moving him up, and Bruce kept showing that he can hit. The competition in center includes Corey Patterson, Ryan Freel, and Norris Hopper. Patterson has a career OBP of .298, enough said. Freel’s career line is .270/.358/.378, so while he can get on base as well as Bruce, he doesn’t have the power that Bruce has. Hopper was 27 before he made it to the majors in 2006. Last year, Hopper saw significant time in the Reds’ outfield and hit .329/.371/.388; so again, he has the on-base ability of Bruce but not the power. Bruce is ready for the majors, but it won’t be surprising if he ends up back at AAA to start the year. As an example of what he can add to the Reds’ 2008 team, I have used PECOTA’s projections and Baseball Musing's Lineup Analysis to estimate the Reds’ projected lineup with Baker’s likely choice in center Patterson and the Reds’ projected lineup with Bruce.

With Patterson:

1. Corey Patterson
2. Jeff Keppinger
3. Ken Griffey, Jr.
4. Brandon Phillips
5. Adam Dunn
6. Edwin Encarnacion
7. Joey Votto
8. David Ross
9. Pitcher

Runs per game: 4.845

With Bruce:

1. Jay Bruce
2. Jeff Keppinger
3. Ken Griffey, Jr.
4. Brandon Phillips
5. Adam Dunn
6. Edwin Encarnacion
7. Joey Votto
8. David Ross
9. Pitcher

Runs per game: 5.024

They estimate Bruce to add nearly 0.2 runs per game to the Reds’ lineup, or 32.4 runs over 162 games. That’s equivalent to about 3 wins in the standings. I think it’s safe to say that their defensive difference isn’t worth that much.

Dusty Baker’s tendencies don’t fit the current profile of the Cincinnati Reds. Following the Reds’ 2007 season, their hopes for 2008 were high based on their four major league-ready top prospects. With Dusty Baker running the show, Reds’ fans should be worried.

I've been thinking about the format of these posts, and I'm going to try something new. Instead of looking at what was good or bad about this past season, I'm going to take a more forward-looking view by looking at the team's strengths and weaknesses heading into the offseason.

In addition, I was hoping that I would start catching up to when teams are actually being eliminated from the playoffs, but that hasn't happened yet. The next team was officially eliminated from the NL Central this past Wednesday as the Reds lost to the Cubs 3-2.

Strengths 

Even after trading away two of their young outfielders last year in Wily Mo Pena and Austin Kearns, the Reds are once again loaded with outfielders as long as Wayne Krivsky and company make the right choice regarding Adam Dunn's option. His club option is for $13M (could be $16M based on award bonuses, but Dunn doesn't get enough praise to win awards) and will activate a full no-trade clause through June 15th when it becomes a limited no-trade (Dunn has to pick 10 teams to which he would accept a trade). Dunn's batting average will probably not be this high again (and .264 isn't that high), but he will be the only player to have hit 40 HR in each of the last four seasons unless either David Ortiz or Albert Pujols hit 9 homers the rest of the way. Although Ken Griffey, Jr. has been shut down the rest of the season, he should be healthy going into 2008. If he can stay healthy is another question altogether. With those two in the corners, Josh Hamilton has surprised many by showing that he is ready for the major leagues. He should also be healthy going into next year despite being out for the rest of the season with a hamstring strain. Another injury has taken Ryan Freel out, but he should be back next year as well. If those four aren't enough, Jay Bruce has been lights out in the minors all year, prompting Baseball Prospectus's prospect guru Kevin Goldstein to declare "Jay Bruce is too good for the minor leagues" in his annual CF Prospect Rankings. Bruce will be following in Joey Votto's shoes, who has staked out his claim to the everyday first base spot in Cincinnati by hitting .353/.411/.549 in 51 at bats since his call-up on the heels of a .294/.381/.478 season at AAA Louisville. With Brandon Phillips at the keystone and Edwin Encarnacion at the hot corner, the Reds are on the verge of having another good offense in the hitters' paradise of Great American Ball Park.

The Reds' rotation also looks to be on the way up as Aaron Harang continues to show that he is a legit #1 pitcher with a 3.61 ERA over 216.2 innings while pitching in the aforementioned hitters' paradise. As the #2 starter, Bronson Arroyo had some slip-ups this year, but a lot of those can be attributed to being overworked in early May. He had consecutive outings of 120, 117, and 129 pitches, which were followed up by six starts in which he gave up 35 runs over 29.2 innings. Back on July 27th, he was kept out there for 123 pitches and proceeded to give up 7 runs over 1.2 in his next start. I know that it isn't correct to just remove those bad starts, but if you just remove those six straight starts in late May and early June, his ERA falls to 3.32 from the 4.37 he currently sports. The Reds manager next year, if it's Pete Mackanin or somebody else, needs to make sure to not overwork Arroyo next year, or he might end up with a broken Arroyo for the next month, or worse. Future additions to the rotation include Homer Bailey, touted as a future #1 by scouts heading into this year, and Johnny Cueto. Bailey has had a rough year, although he returned to the big leagues Thursday in San Francisco and got the win by going 5.2 and only allowing one run. He was kept on a pretty tight leash as he was held to only 80 pitches in his first start since being sidelined with a groin strain. Cueto will most likely start the season at AAA, but if he pitches well, he could be slotted into the rotation midseason.

Weaknesses

The bullpen in Cincinnati has been terrible once again. David Weathers and Jared Burton seem to be the only guys that can be relied upon in the bullpen. Once you remove the starting pitchers from the equation, the Reds' bullpen has an ERA of 5.06. If you further remove Weathers and Burton, that figure jumps to 5.74. While they need to fix the bullpen, the Reds have always approached this situation the wrong way. Instead of throwing money at veterans like they have with Mike Stanton ($2M for a 6.11 ERA, $3M for next year, and a $500K buyout for 2009), they should find hard-throwing pitchers that other organizations have given up on and see what they can get out of them. Burton was a Rule 5 pick this past winter, and Jon Coutlangus was a waiver claim. The two of them combined for $760K and a 3.25 ERA over 83 innings. Coutlangus can be a good LOOGY (Lefty One Out GuY) if he stops walking them around the bases. Left-handers only managed a .206 average against him, but Coutlangus has given up 16 walks in 17.1 innings against lefties.

Overall

The Reds might need to sign one or two league-average starting pitchers for 2008 to be able to compete, but they shouldn't sign any FA pitcher to a long-term deal. If they can get a good deal on just one starter, they could be setting themselves up for a run at the Brewers and Cubs in the NL Central in 2009 and beyond. It'll be tough to top the Brewers over the next four or five years, but with the young talent coming up, the Reds just might have a shot.