By Thaq Diesel

I’m reminded of the 1987 Toronto Blue Jays, who choked away the final seven games of the season to miss the playoffs in lieu of the Detroit Tigers.  In my twisted mind, I’m substituting “Cincinnati” for “Detroit” and St. Louis for Toronto.  It will probably be Houston playing the role of Detroit if it happens at all.  Still, a boy can dream.

• The way Cincinnati has played the Cubs this season is pretty representative of the Reds season. They’ve hovered around .500 against them and should have beaten them more than they have, all things being equal.  Oh, and they had six errors against them on Saturday.  And the Reds scored 75% of their runs off a homer.  It’s like a picture snapshot of the season!
• Sunday, Aaron Harang threw 87 of his 110 pitches for strikes.  That’s what you call rearing back and throwing it.  Suffice to say, he didn’t walk a batter. 
• I like the name Norris Hopper.  It’s like a cross between a hockey division and an evil grasshopper character from A Bugs Life.  My next kid is getting that name, boy or girl.
• “He was about crying in the dugout that it wasn’t a legal game, and I told him there’s no crying in baseball,” second baseman Juan Castro said.  That tells me a) that Norris is a rookie and b) that Juan Castro really is a leader in the clubhouse.  My favorite Castro moment of the year is when he sat near anyone in the dugout who hit a home run so his kids could see him on TV when the Reds were at an away game. 
• One more week of baseball left.  Man that was fast.

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