Marcell Ozuna pic.twitter.com/iu5keS6hvU
— Jason Collette (@jasoncollette) April 27, 2019
Reds 3 – Cardinals 6 | Game 26 of 162
Box Score | Win Probability | Exit Velocity | Pitch Velocity
Run Prevention
Tyler Mahle was just so-so today, striking out only 2 and walking 3 in 5 innings. Mahle had gone 17 innings without a walk before giving up one in the 2nd inning. The second and third walks came in to score. Mahle finished the day with a 4.50 ERA for the season. His fielding independent stats are better: 3.86 FIP, 3.50 xFIP, 3.35 SIERA. In 28 IP he has 26 strikeouts.
Zach Duke was called on for the 6th inning. In 11 pitches, he hit two batters and gave up a single for a run. Duke is tied for most appearances in the Reds bullpen at 14. In 8 innings, he’s got 4 strikeouts and 6 walks. Latest stats: 11.25 ERA, 8.36 FIP, 6.30 xFIP. He’s not getting the job done. How much longer will the Reds keep using him?
Michael Lorenzen, whose fastball hit 98 mph a few times, pitched two innings to finish out the game.
Joey Votto made an error on a routine ground ball in the first inning, playing it off to the side and booting it.
Run Production
After hitting eleventy million home runs yesterday, the Reds failed to slug a long ball today. They put two runs across in the third inning on a Scott Schebler walk, Mahle sacrifice bunt, Jose Peraza ground ball single and an Eugenio Suarez single. They led 2-0.
They added another run in the sixth with a Jesse Winker opposite field double, Yasiel Puig single to right and a 393-foot sac fly by Derek Dietrich.
Scott Schebler’s miserable start at the plate continues. But he has drawn 12 walks.
Senzel Breathless Anticipation Watch
The Louisville Bats play at 6:30 tonight.
What’s Next
The Reds (11-15) play the stupid Cardinals (16-10) tomorrow afternoon in the finale of the three game series again at 2:15 p.m. ET at Busch Stadium. The starting pitchers are Sonny Gray and Jack Flaherty (23, RHP). The Reds and Cardinals have split the four games they’ve played this season.
Well said.
I’m hoping he’s just doing it to pressure the front office to cut bait on him.
We are one month in. Most players are finally settling in. Here are the main 3 things that need to happen to help this team
1) Send Schebler down / call up Senzel: this should happen by next homestand.
2) Casili gets more starts if not become main catcher
3) Release Duke
Agree with all 3 of these
Ted Barrett is Chris Welch’s friend and all, but he had an awful strike zone today. When you can’t get the inside corner right, you are just bad.
They are going to have to rewrite the algorithms on WAR to take into account Zack Duke.
That was an organizational decision, Dick Williams bears the responsibility for it. I don’t doubt that Bell favored it, but it was not his ultimate decision.
Sonny should help in our quest for a win tomorrow. Lets get some hitting going.
The more I listen to Bell the more I am not really thrilled with him as manager. He makes generalized comments all the time. I like how Mahle owned up to his mistakes. I have been complaining about Bell not letting pitchers pitch today that backfired on me but honestly, I am ok with that. The problem I don’t understand is Zach Duke. Seriously why is he still on the team. its almost been a month and he has near the MOST outings by our pitchers yet continues to allow walks and runs and just very blah pitching. I Can’t take much more of this with him. There has to be someone in AAA that is pitching better than this. There really hasn’t been any place to look for hope with him too. Stop helping the other team win by throwing him out there so often if your going to make us suffer and keep him.
You’re essentially telling us not to have a thought about any contributing factors that helped cause the Reds to lose this game. Sorry that will never happen.
Are the things you mentioned the only contributing factors definitely not, but they also didn’t help.
Yes tomorrow is another day and hopefully its Sonny for the Reds.
I like Mahle long term, but he needs to setup the fastball better? Disco started mixing it up much better and his last 2 starts have been fantastic! If Wood isn’t available then give Lorenzen or Stephenson a shot if Mahle continues to slump.
Cody Reed with 6.1 combined scoreless innings. Reed in & Duke out….its not rocket science? Dusty and Price loved “gritty” veterans, but they’re gone.
How long will they stay with Duke? Cody threw 3 innings with 5 ks today. Schebler this week has gone 0-13 with 10k’s. He clearly doesn’t belong in the Bigs and needs to get sent down to make adjustments.
I think the criticism of David Bell and particularly Zach Duke so far is fair, but I think a couple of things should be taken in context.
First, the Reds needed more than anything to not start off disastrously this year. They started 1-8. Of their first twenty games, at least 13 were decided by two runs or less. These are games that a manager should be throwing everything he has to try and steal a game, and David Bell did. As is documented, he has been very aggressive using pitchers and exploring matchups. Given the urgency for a decent start, and the game scenarios, this seems very reasonable to me. Watching this one, it seemed like Bell was much more willing to lay back and preserve the best arms for tomorrow, with Sonny Gray starting against Flaherty. Given the usage of the relievers, this seems pretty reasonable, and gives the Reds on paper a better chance to win the series. I’d rather chance throwing all my resources behind Gray than bad-day Mahle.
As for Duke, he is clearly not doing his job. But, it’s April, and the team should try to build his confidence before they throw away 2 mil. It’s not working, and they should rapidly cut bait if he doesn’t pick it up, but they hired Derek Johnson for a reason, and I’m sure they take his input when they signed him. Fair to check him out, but he should be approaching the end of his leash.
Excellent comment….could not agree more!
I agree with you about the fifth inning and preferred strategy Cossack. I’m just saying that the bullpen has been being used at an unsustainable pace, and justifiably so, but I don’t know how long you can keep using 6 guys every night.
Yesterday’s game does seem different than what Bell has said and done, but I think there are points where he has to be a bit more selective about using pitchers. With a winnable game today, and 4 against a beatable Mets team coming up (all in the middle of 19 straight games without a day off), I can understand why he didn’t want to start using (or have to use at some point) our best arms over five innings. I think it’s also possible that the struggles so far of the guys at AAA that were the presumptive “next guys up” in most of our minds (chiefly Reed and Romano) could play a part in having to adapt the bullpen philosophy.
Additionally, with Wood having a setback yesterday, Mahle is gonna be leaned upon for a while longer, possibly MUCH longer, and I don’t know how helpful he’ll be without developing and fighting through a bad day to give the team more than four innings. Especially when your primary long man pitched 1 1/3 the day before, and probably couldn’t give you more than 2.
I don’t think you’re wrong about going to the pen in the fifth Cossack, I’m just saying that I think Bell managed differently yesterday than he has all year, and that there are some reasons I could understand for him doing so. I’m not trying to be an apologist, and it’s a small sample, but so far I think he’s done a pretty reasonable job, and hasn’t given me reason to lose faith that this could be a frisky team this year. Or that he will be a good manager.
Zach Duke is bad at baseball
What’s the most recent update on Wood?
Lorenzen with 10.2 straight scoreless with 8 ks/2 walks. He gives up hits but they’re often like the other night where 1 was a groundball hit right to 2b, but we shifted it into a hit. The other was a Peraza style looper over the infield. He keeps the ball in the yard and he can hit. If they’re going to stick with 13 pitchers then some 4-5 inning starts while stretching a guy out isn’t a problem.
Big game today! Typical Reds pattern…hit a ton of HRs in a laugher and then end up losing the series? They can’t keep losing divisional games!
Senzel hitting .235 with a double, two walks and five strikeouts, along with a fielding error. Not yet savior level performance.
Mahle almost made it out of the 5th. I don’t fault DB for letting start the 5th…but maybe you bring in someone to pitch to Ozuna the second time.