maybe the reds only mistake was projecting quicker evolution / development of their pitching prospects. quality of instruction is the next question, which is a entirely different post, and something i think williams has been addressing. i personally thought and continue to believe that mid 2018 is the cut off point, for many of them, because many are not young anymore - mid 20's - and the reds acquired them in generally the same time frame, which has created a bottleneck.
too often, in the last decade, i've seen a young reds pitcher get to the major leagues and suddenly not trust his stuff. way way too many pitches thrown. way too many pitchers with only two mlb legitmate pitches. imo, those days are receding into the past. double danny darwin's salary today would be my advise. actually, triple it.
i've noticed the same things you guys have with each individual pitcher. the goal is consistency. i, like h-n-r, am willing to be a little patient with that as long as i see improvement and building toward consistent good outings. this is part conjecture on my part, but so far the really successful reds pitchers have come from pensacola under the tutelage of danny darwin. castillo and mahle made their biggest improvements and advances at pensacola. it's where they converted peralta from starter to relief.
i watched a lot of international league play last year, and compared overall team pitching, because it's where the reds made their largest investments. not necessarily money, but in time and effort. there are a lot of factors involved with each mlb team's system and process. i think it's fair to say they all work hard to improve their prospects. it's also fair to say that louisville had very similar raw talent compared to indianapolis, durham, and scranton. which begs the question: why are other teams more successful at development with similar, or lesser rated, pitching talent? one thing I've definitely noticed is other organizations improvement seems more ordered and progress comes in more well defined stages of success. there just seems to be a disconnect between the blue wahoos and the bats. take this with a grain of salt, because it's coming from a fan who is using his eyeballs and not qualified to be giving any organizational pitching advice to anyone at the professional level. when mlb-dot, or any other supposedly qualified organization, ranks mlb team's farm systems they do it on the basis of the sheer number of highly touted or arbitrarily evaluated prospects within the organizations. these rankings never talk about the most important factor involved in such a list: instruction. i don't think peralta, mahle, lopez, and castillo -among others- would be as far along as they are without having been tutored by danny darwin. at this point, from what i've seen, castillo and mahle are the only two prospects that look like legitimate mlb starting pitchers. romano looks like a very good 7th / 8th inning relief power pitcher. i suspect how his change develops will dictate his role. garrett impresses me as a potential pitch to contact starter with k ability in his back pocket.
the reds success hinges on the young pitching prospects. i know that sounds overly simplified, because all teams rely on their pitching. but, the reds are a small market team that must develop it's own pitching to be successful. like all mid / small market teams, they cannot afford any top line mlb starting pitching via free agency. regardless of all the above, i'm relieved to see the reds: 1) have the young pitching talent in abundance, and 2) are using it. the veteran starting pitcher signings of the last 3 or 4 off-seasons were sad and pathetic shells of the their former selves walking, in some cases, limping to the mound. it was actually embarrassing as a reds fan. i'm glad they didn't do that this year.
It tells me that Senzel isn't going to play 3B. With Dillson essentially not going to make the team, I'd assume they are penciling him in at 2B. Perhaps we see a Scooter trade soon.The Reds have extended Suarez for a reported 7 years. Haven't seen a dollar amount.
I was a little surprised when the Reds didn't sign him to an extension similiar to what they did with Tucker Barnhart prior to settling his arbitration case. But it now appears they were working on a deal. I'd assume they were bound by arbitration rule timelines to settle the case while they crossed the t's and dotted the I's on an extension.
I'm surprised at the length of the extension, but thought they should extend him through arbitration years with a couple option years tacked on.