• Have something to say? Register Now! and be posting in minutes!

Best Reds lefty ever?

JohnU

Aristocratic Hoosier
8,883
559
113
Joined
Apr 17, 2013
Location
Indiana
Hoopla Cash
$ 1,000.00
Fav. Team #1
Fav. Team #2
Fav. Team #3
EVER is a decent amount of time and since nobody in this group really remembers Vander Meer, we are left to our memories. In a feeble attempt to generate some hot stove chatter, who's your favorite southpaw? Or the best ever?

"Jose" Nuxhall
Jim O'Toole
Jim Merritt
Don Gullett
Tom Browning
Bill Bray
Tony Cingrani
Some Cuban guy

Or THIS amazing relief pitcher!
 

eburg5000

Active Member
1,305
16
38
Joined
Apr 19, 2013
Hoopla Cash
$ 1,000.00
Fav. Team #1
Fav. Team #2
Fav. Team #3
Don Gullet, Tom Browning, But I have a soft place in my heart for Fred Norman and Will McEnaney, because of those glory years. And I don't want to forget the Old left hander..
But it's really hard to say of all the left handers the Reds have had, Who was the best...Maybe Chapman,
 

JohnU

Aristocratic Hoosier
8,883
559
113
Joined
Apr 17, 2013
Location
Indiana
Hoopla Cash
$ 1,000.00
Fav. Team #1
Fav. Team #2
Fav. Team #3
Gullett's numbers are generally off the chart for efficiency.
We will never know how good Chapman was because of what he became -- an expensive waste of roster space.
 

Hit-n-Run

Go Reds!!!
2,157
29
48
Joined
Apr 17, 2013
Hoopla Cash
$ 1,000.00
Fav. Team #1
Fav. Team #2
Fav. Team #3
Don Gullett was a good one, albeit it in a pretty short career.

Danny Jackson had the best single season I can remember. Losing the Cy Young to Orel Hershiser and his consecutive inning scoring streak.

John Franco had a good run in Cincy and went on to have a great career. Traded for Randy Meyers who rounded out the Nasty Boys.

Norm Charlton running over Mike Scioscia would have to get honorable mention.

Claude Osteen went on to have a good career after being traded.
 

JohnU

Aristocratic Hoosier
8,883
559
113
Joined
Apr 17, 2013
Location
Indiana
Hoopla Cash
$ 1,000.00
Fav. Team #1
Fav. Team #2
Fav. Team #3
Pete Schourek had a great year in '95 but he's not close to that popular or that great.
Some notable seasons. I think Gullett may have been the most talented of all of them, even Chapman.
 

eburg5000

Active Member
1,305
16
38
Joined
Apr 19, 2013
Hoopla Cash
$ 1,000.00
Fav. Team #1
Fav. Team #2
Fav. Team #3
I remember back when Gullett first came up that everyone was talking about how great his fast ball was, because he was hitting the 90's. Today that would be average at best. Are pitchers today throwing that much harder or are radar guns better today.
Myself I sometimes wonder if radar guns are calibrated to add a few more mph to a fast ball. Fans get excited when a fastball hits 100 mph, sort of like a dunk in basketball.
 

Redsfan1507

It is what it is
2,758
23
38
Joined
Apr 17, 2013
Hoopla Cash
$ 1,000.00
Fav. Team #1
Fav. Team #2
Fav. Team #3
No one has EVER thrown harder than Aroldis Chapman. NO ONE. Think about that for a minute.
 

Redsfan1507

It is what it is
2,758
23
38
Joined
Apr 17, 2013
Hoopla Cash
$ 1,000.00
Fav. Team #1
Fav. Team #2
Fav. Team #3
Water under the bridge, but...

You know the most astounding thing to me about Chapman ? The GABP crowd response when he came in....

Didn't really matter what the score was, the crowd was juiced...I watched Koufax and Ryan and Johnson and Carlton and Gibson...the real badass relievers of the day(s) and every Reds "phenom" since the mid 60's....and NEVER remember the kind of crowd response Chapman got...it was an instant "event"....Maybe Babe Ruth or Josh Gibson or Joe DiMaggio or Satchel Paige in their day might have elicited similar excitement ? Did Mariano Rivera in Yankee Stadium have that (Maybe Chico would know ?) The Missile was greeted like the pitching version of Roy Flippin Hobbs, wasn't he ?

...AND THE REDS STILL TRADED HIM FOR BUBBLE GUM CARDS. The guy would have maxed ticket sales once a week as a starter, or kept people buying beers if there was a chance of seeing him late in any game, if he closed. How could any businessman NOT even try to keep that cash cow ? No offense to Joey Votto, who IMO might be the best all-around hitter in Reds HISTORY before it's over and I'd ALWAYS take a HOF regular over a pitcher as most important to the team, but Chapman would sell more tickets than JV.

You think the Yankees brought him back for their "rebuild" ? Phhhffft...he's a lock for bump in income if he takes the hill.
 

JohnU

Aristocratic Hoosier
8,883
559
113
Joined
Apr 17, 2013
Location
Indiana
Hoopla Cash
$ 1,000.00
Fav. Team #1
Fav. Team #2
Fav. Team #3
...AND THE REDS STILL TRADED HIM FOR BUBBLE GUM CARDS. The guy would have maxed ticket sales once a week as a starter, or kept people buying beers if there was a chance of seeing him late in any game, if he closed. How could any businessman NOT even try to keep that cash cow ? No offense to Joey Votto, who IMO might be the best all-around hitter in Reds HISTORY before it's over and I'd ALWAYS take a HOF regular over a pitcher as most important to the team, but Chapman would sell more tickets than JV.
Reds have shown an annoying tendency to be conscious of contracts and payroll. I have no idea what they think this is doing to fan support. Note, I did not use the word "apathy" but I'd hate to sink as low as they did in Pittsburgh for 20 years.
 

eburg5000

Active Member
1,305
16
38
Joined
Apr 19, 2013
Hoopla Cash
$ 1,000.00
Fav. Team #1
Fav. Team #2
Fav. Team #3
Reds have shown an annoying tendency to be conscious of contracts and payroll. I have no idea what they think this is doing to fan support

I don't think they care anymore
 

Redsfan1507

It is what it is
2,758
23
38
Joined
Apr 17, 2013
Hoopla Cash
$ 1,000.00
Fav. Team #1
Fav. Team #2
Fav. Team #3
I think the Reds are being pressured by shareholders who care more about short term dividends than market share.

More expensive pie isn't always more profitable, especially if you can use discount ingredients and sell it for more than the more expensive, better tasting pie. That's exactly what the Reds are doing now. They are currently selling inferior, cheap pie, at a higher price than the "Post Season" pies.

The worst part is, if you look at the actual payroll expenditures, they haven't saved anything in gutting the roster. Griffey still gets payments to his "hometown discount of 17 years ago. Votto's quarter Billion dollar paydown isn't half yet. Bailey will drain this payroll for several more years. Mesoraco's deal is probably a sunk cost. They paid Phillips $13 M to play against them this year, etc.

It may be YEARS before the Reds can budget for a legitimate winner in today's MLB price range, with no discussion of how they could MAINTAIN one.

Pitching can turn around a franchise quicker than anything else, and in the absence of money, developing talent is the only way. That's a tough enough mission the Reds haven't had much success with, but if they can only afford keep that talent for 3-4 seasons into MLB service, it's tougher. Simple math tells you that if you had an unprecedented 2-3 successful rookies each year, you would have to turn them over long before you had a team of them on the same roster. The Reds have to start developing consistent talent, AND stop giving their established talent away when they turn them over, or they will never get out of the cellar.

BTW, I changed my vote- I think maybe the Best Reds Lefty ever is Marty Brennaman.
 

chico ruiz

Member
423
7
18
Joined
Apr 18, 2013
Hoopla Cash
$ 1,000.00
Fav. Team #1
Fav. Team #2
Fav. Team #3
had to scroll back up to post this one word warning: tangential.

1507 hits the nail on the head with the above post & post #112 on the 'cactus schedule' thread. it's conspicuously relative to the reds potential success. hamilton (among others) must get his obp to .330 minimally. divisional disparity? the cubs on base percentage of their top 4 slots was .380+ in 2016. not only cumulatively, but also individually. they did this without schwarber. addison russell had the same on-base% as billy hamilton, but he batted down in the order and had 90+ rbi's. the scary part? their young hitters are only going to get better. this is what the reds are up against. the reds can't wait, because the cubs won't. if the cubs continue that kind of on-base mastery, they will bludgeon the nl-c for 5 consecutive years. the sheer number of run scoring chances are too overwhelming. you don't have to be in the fantasy world of metric geekdom to understand that ratio. it's not advanced formulae. this is simple math. the advent of putting emphasis on on-base %? 100 years ago. i know numbers collation can be dry / soul-less and sometimes those same bean counters outsmart themselves. listening to bill james evaluate & judge talent was / is like watching paint dry. worse, it's like watching the first coat dry and realizing it will need another coat. but, the final application of the on-base % stat is one that is irrefutable. there's a lot i disagree with james about, because -in most cases- he disregards the human element, defense, and the intangibles.

but, he's not the only mlb associate trending toward dehumanization. ken burn's doc kept driving home the idea of baseball being a representation of america in the form of a game. that's god damn right, and it included some elements of graft. what could be more american? that includes trying to get an advantage within a loose set of parameters. the most dispiriting incursion, to me, on baseball, has been the systematic removal of the human element. i liked the umpires being the final word on calls. the catcher and second base line sliding rules are nonsensical to this purist. 4 balls should have to be thrown to issue an intentional walk. they're fucking with150 years of tradition to assuage those same shareholders 1507 mentions . there's nothing gentle or passive about the game between the lines. it's a brutal, furious, and blindingly fast game at its core. there was a time honored alluring righteousness and congruity to it that has faded over the years.

for instance, until 1950, mlb only required that the height of the mound be no more than 15” above the baseline, but didn't really address a minimum height. lack of interest in the state of the mound by mlb led to attempts to adjust the height from 0-15 inches to suit the style of individual home team pitchers, or work against the style of visiting pitchers. altering the height of the mound gradually developed into an art form. if you watch any footage of the original senators, you'll notice as a means of fully utilizing the blinding side-arm speed of walter johnson, washington leveled off the mound so completely that it was almost a depression instead of an elevation. i realize i'm covering a huge swath of time, but i think it gets to the original essence of the game.

mlb lowered the mound after 1968. ' year of the pitcher,' they called it. they make it sound like the mounds were mysteriously raised in the dark of the night before every mlb game in 1968 only. the height of the mound had been the same for 50+ years. it varied, but was more standardized after 1950. what happened before 1968? nothing happened, other than baseball games were played. the real reason: media consultants told mlb offices that only purists enjoyed shutouts and close, low-scoring games. “pitchers’ matches,” they called them. sounds more like cricket than baseball. and, of course, it would coming from the pie hole of a overly flatulent bean counter. they surmised the majority of fans wanted to see more scoring and more home runs. that's simple enough. we get it. steroids wasn't a problem either; until it was. they could care less if a player's dick shrinks to the size of a pistachio, but it's difficult to hide a man's head continuing to grow at 30+ years old. by god, mlb didn't acquiesce until it became visibly grotesque. but, it wasn't the 'cheating' mlb execs were concerned about. it was the potential for players stroking out and dropping dead. not good for ratings. the dollar. always the dollar.

there was a time when major league baseball was not a tasteless simulacrum of the american soul. it was not a dispassionate corporate representation of money grubbing facade. i guess, ironically and after all, baseball is an accurate representation of this country.
 
Top