so, even though i nearly missed my flight in montreal this morning because i got held up in customs (took over an hour... in all the times i've flown out of dorval it's never taken more than 10 minutes) and then, once i did manage to run through the jetway and on to the plane as they were shutting the door,  we sat on the tarmac for 1 1/2 hours waiting for a freakishly long thunderstorm to pass... well, let's just say i was lucky to get back in time.  but i did, and i'm glad.  some thoughts/observations:

 

1) went throught the reds hall of fame to see the new exhibits.  the nuxy tribute is really great, and everyone should make an effort to go see it.  also, i can still throw strikes as long as i keep it under 50 mph.  that's just sad.

 

2) marty brennaman was nice enough to take time for a picture with my wife.  she was very happy.  she's worried that the grin is too cheesy because she was so excited to get the picture taken.

http://www.thelotd.com/rpa/gallery/view_gallery.one?gal_id=270226

 

3) also in attendance we had walt jocketty, cesar geronimo, joey jay, jeff keppinger and jerry hairston jr.  for some reason, i couldn't think of anything to say to any of them except for joey jay, so i didn't even walk up for the obligatory handshake... but was happy to shake hands with joey jay and tell him it was an honor.  i think people forget how great he was for this team for a couple of years in the early 60s.

 

4) joey jay looks pretty good for a guy who is 72 years old.

 

5) walt jocketty is about 10-20x more forthcoming with info than wayne krivsky was.  and it's not really a matter of him actually revaling anything more than krivsky did, it's just a matter of not treating the job of running a baseball team like it's a matter of national security.  for instance, when asked "how are you going to make ths into a winning ballclub", he answered "well, i want good defense up the middle... catcher, 2nd base, shortstop, centerfield.  i like speed.  good defense helps your pitching be better, good speed helps your offense be better".  that's a paraphrase but you get the idea.  nothing specific.  but it helps me (as a fan) think the team has a future if i feel like the gm at least has some plan in mind.  jocketty also admitted that it sure would be nice to have a right handed slugger to put in the middle of the lineup.  not exactly an earth shattering revelation, but something i think krivsky would have been hesitant to agree with if asked.

 

6) jocketty said it's too early to even think about specifics for free agency, like about whether or not dunn and/or griffey would be back... and i agree.  i don't think that means he hasn't been thinking hard about the dunn situation, though.  but he also mentioned these two weeks leading up to the trading deadline are a busy time...

 

7) jocketty said so far the responsible scout (name isn't coming to me right now) is the only one talking to yonder alonso's agent, but he might get involved now.  he made a comment that would be dangerously close to collusion if we were talking about already-established major leaguers... something to the effect that "all major league clubs are trying to keep the bonus money for these draft picks in check" and that the money given to these guys was getting ridiculous.

 

7a) also... alonso is represented by the same agent as adam dunn.

 

8) jocketty mentioned burton's strained lat, and that he was treated over the break and just threw in the last 24 hours or so and things looked good for a reasonably quick comeback.  mentioned they asked the broadcast team not to mention the injury in milwaukee... and that when weathers came in for the second day in a row, the brewers gm, sitting next to jocketty, made a comment "weathers instead of burton?  interesting."  jocketty said he just didn't say anything.

 

9) jerry hairston jr. seems to enjoy talking.  he's also a bit shorter than i would have guessed but his forearms seem abnormally large for someone his size.

 

10) hairston related a pretty funny prank he pulled on gerald laird when he was with the rangers.  apparently had him in tears.

 

11) j-kepp is a quiet guy.  deferred to hairston on most questions the audience had for the current reds.

 

12) i couldn't tell if j-kepp was wearing high socks.

 

13) j-kepp did say that when he first came back from the injury his quad in that leg was very weak but now he's back to 100%.

 

14) did i mention hairston likes to talk?

 

15) jocketty said that freel's rehab isn't going well and that surgery may be the result... should know more in a week or two.

 

16) didn't win any raffle prize tickets, but everyone who didn't got a nice gift - a little soft-sided reds cooler and some stickers and magnets.

 

and that's about it.  the reds put on a good show for this thing... if you're a season ticket holder and haven't been to one, it's fun and you should take the opportunity... it was well done and a much better way to spend two hours than working (which is what i was supposed to be doing...)

i like cincinnati, even if i don't get to spend much time here these days.

 

i like montreal, or at least i like it in the summer.  i'd move there in a minute if my wife didn't have a good job here, my family wasn't all in ohio and i thought i could survive the winters.

 

i like southern california, but i'm not sure i could live there.  i mean, it's just weird.  but i'm from the midwest, i guess it's supposed to seem strange to me.  all those stucco tan buildings start to look the same after a while.

 

ugh.

 

too much travel.

well, the game was fun today. cueto threw pretty well until his meltdown. bruce mania continues to run rampant in the greater tri-state area. mostly, though, nice to see cueto have maybe his best start since his debut. well, all except for that one inning. he was pretty pitch-inefficient early on but got it under control by the 3rd.

and it got me to thinking... doesn't it seem like cueto rolls along other than giving up lots of homers? it got me to thinking... more on that later.

first up - hatteberg was designated for assignment. rumor has it the mariners are interested (hatteberg lives in the pacific northwest, i think) and are thinking about releasing richie sexson.

now.... sexson is due a pretty ridiculous sum of money. but i wonder if maybe a trade could be worked out if the mariners will eat most of the contract. sexson is right handed. he has some pop (not much average, though). just a thought. and it's not that i am at all unhappy with having andy phillips on the team. he's a versitile dude. but he actually hits righties a lot better than lefties and has never demonstrated the kind of power in the bigs that he's shown in the minors...

anyway, about cueto. it seems to me he has a tendency to really miss badly in the strike zone occasionally (perhaps a side-effect of his normally good control).

he's given up 39 earned runs this year in 12 starts. he's given up 14 hr. unless other folks on the board moved up today, that ties him for 3rd in mlb. (harang, incidentally, is 13th. arroyo is 40th.)

it got me to thinking, how does that percentage stack up. i mean, it seems to be a pretty pure measure of mistake pitches... it doesn't even count the other guy the homer might have driven in (who may have dinked, dunked, or otherwise gotten on base despite a good job by the pitcher and might have managed to score some other way (combos of groundouts, sacrifiects, etc) that might not really be much of a "mistake")

so, i grabbed some stats. looked at guys who had given up 15 or more runs this year (volquez has given up 15, so i figure that's a good line to draw to throw out guys without enough stats.)

and what i found was interesting. cueto is giving up more runs off of the guy crossing the plate after hitting a homer than most pitchers, but he's by far not the worst. in fact, among pitchers who have given up 15 or more runs this year, he's 21st with 14 hr to 44 r (a ratio of 31.9%).

some interesting names in front of him:

johan santana (6th, 40%)

ben sheets (10th, 37.5%)

josh beckett (15th, 33.3%)

so i guess this really doesn't indicate that you're a bad pitcher. if i was less lazy, i'd look up how tom browning looked by this measurement (i mean, i recall him giving up LOTS of home runs. not sure if that's just perception though).

some of the lower percentages in the majors belong to sinkerball pitchers, as one might expect:

fausto carmona (2nd, 4.5%)

chien-ming wang (10th, 8.3%)

kyle loshe (really?) (17th, 9.4%)

brandon webb (38thth, 12.9%)

i'm not sure what, if anything, this means. but i found it interesting.

it amazes me that carmona has only given up 1 hr this year considering that he has only struck out 23 batters in 58 innings pitched. i mean, that's a lot of guys making contact. you'd think they would occasionaly get lucky and put one over the fence, right?

the only guy to hit a homer off of carmona this year? the feared slugger from the royals - david dejesus. he has 4 hr this year in 159 ab. talk about your mistakes.

too bad carmona hurt himself fielding his position. he's a fun pitcher to watch.

oh yeah, cueto. one other thing i noticed - even in the 7th he was hitting 96 on the radar gun. now, i think the gun at gabp may run a little hot... but it was still interesting to see him throwing so hard after 90+ pitches. i think he might have just been tired and started leaving them up in the zone a bit.

oh well, time for bed.

it's a lot more fun when you win.

 

1) harang gets a tough no-decision.  guy can't catch a break, it seems.  of course, carmona pitched just as well today, if not better.  but he's not 2-5 like harang is.

 

2) when phillips fouled that ball off his leg, the first thing i thought of was keppinger.  scarier moment than it should have been.

 

3) speaking of phillips, he will be lucky if he doesn't have a concussion by the end of this series.  he is going to get drilled.  i'm surprised it didn't happen today, but i think that was just because the game was so close.  i like his energy, but, well, he's asking for a high inside fastball when he starts showing off after hitting singles, big singles though they may be.

 

4) stormy continues to not look quite right to me.  just something about how he's throwing and how he's (not) locating his pitches.

 

5) damn dunn and his worthless home runs.  we should trade that bum.  also doesn't hustle in the field, either.  unless you count going over the wall to catch foul balls.

 

6) someone needs to give the reds pitchers a lesson about hurrying up to the plate.  all those indians steals today were off the pitchers, not bad.

 

i didn't think the reds would win 5 games this whole month, let alone in a row.