Archive for 2006

June 10, 1976 at Three Rivers Stadium 

Reds 6, Pirates 1  (35-20)

With Joe Morgan out of the lineup with a hamstring injury, starter Don Gullett threw his second straight gem to lead the Reds to a 5-1 win.  Gullett gave up one run on six hits and he struck out four in his complete game, and he improved to 5-2 on the season.

George Foster drove in two runs and had two hits.  Pete Rose and Ken Griffey both scored twice.

June 9, 1976 at Three Rivers Stadium 

Reds 6, Pirates 1  (34-20)

Gary Nolan threw a gem as the Reds took the Pirates down for the second straight game.  Nolan’s complete game improved his record to 5-3 and he gave up only a single run on five hits while striking out five.

Tony Perez hit his seventh homerun of the season and he drove in three runs.  Doug Flynn scored twice after coming into the game after Joe Morgan, who had hit four homeruns in the past two days and singled home a run in today’s game, left the game with a hamstring injury.

By Thaq Diesel

A look at the last four wins:

•  Monday – Griffey comes up HUGE with a 3-run jack in the 9th inning to take the lead on a fat fastball on a 3-2 count.  Coffey has a no-stress save.  F-Lo goes 4 for 5.  Starting pitching and middle relief not so great.   Just win, baby.
• Tuesday – Eric Milton is one start away from officially becoming yet a third dominant starter for the Reds.  His change up is really starting to get nasty.  There is an Adam Dunn sighting in this game.  Griffey gets dinged up again, though it looks to be minor.  Edwin Encarnacion looked like he was shot when he fell to the ground while running the bases.  You thought blown ACL, blown hammy, he was bit by a Black Widow spider…  It turned out to be just a mild sprain, but it must have hurt like hell.
• Wednesday – A series sweep of a bitter rival in their house.  How sweet it is!  Aaron Harang dinged up his ERA just a tad when he ran out of gas in the sixth, but in the ‘Natti it’s all about results and a win is a win.  Dave Weathers continues to sputter a bit.  The Reds ordered up some Coffey in the 9th and it was strong.
• Thursday – Some retribution was delivered for the smack laid down by Chicago last week.  Bronson Arroyo looks to be a leader on this team – he has some street cred with the championship he earned with Boston.  He was quoted saying this Reds team is a confident as the Red Sox in the playoffs.  A bit of hyperbole, perhaps, but he’s leading with his arm.  Great offensive production from the bottom of the batting order.  Adam Dunn is in a real funk.  This team is smoking hot and is hitting on all cylinders right now.

Random Thoughts

• The Reds have all the team components required to win.  Not all the pieces have necessarily been working at the same time, but this team has what it takes to be a playoff team.  Most notably, pitching, depth and great pinch hitting have been key strengths.  Hitting has not been noticably absent at times, though during this winning streak hitting has certainly improved.
• I love watching Todd Coffey coming out of the bullpen like a clumsy freight train.  It’s not a cool entrance like, say, Trevor Hoffman.  However, the zeal Coffey displays has to give the opposing team some pause.  I wonder if the bullpen coach tells him something like, “If you can beat Javier Valentin to the mound, there’s a hot dog hidden under the rosen bag.”
• How fun was it to watch Griffey jack out a game-winning home run Monday night?  It was a reminder of the immense talent he has and a great moment in his career.  I saw the catcher set up outside on the 3-2 count, but the ball stayed over the plate.  Griff got around on the ball with that easy swing and it exploded off his bat.  It was even sweeter to ding up the Cardinals and their vaunted closer Jason Isringhausen.
• Cincinnati, and his subsequent release was the best thing to happen to Tony Womack the past two years.  Talk about being motivated by your ex… 

June 8, 1976 at Three Rivers Stadium 

Reds 10, Pirates 5  (33-20)

The Reds scored in the double figures for the third time in five games as the bounced back against the Pirates.  Joe Morgan hit two more homeruns and had four in the past two games.  He drove in three and scored three runs.  Ken Griffey also went deep and drove in three runs and drew two walks.

Rookie starter Santo Alcala was shaky but he improved to 6-1 on the season.  He gave up three runs on eight hits and two walks with five strikeouts in 6 2/3 innings.  Will McEnaney struck out the final Pirate to notch his second save of the season.

The Reds are hot.  Red hot.  Six straight wins and the last two have been over the division leading Cardinals.  If we win tonight, we’re tied for first place.  It’s kind of hard to believe.  Not as hard to believe as the Tigers being in first place, but still pretty hard to believe.

Going along with the hot streak has been Ken Griffey, Jr.’s run.  He’s now hitting .298 with ten homeruns and 34 RBIs and that’s in only 32 games.  He has an eight game hitting streak and in six of those games, Griffey’s had two or more hits.  Griffey also has four homeruns during the hitting streak.  He’s off today.

Edwin Encarnacion sprained his ankle, and it looks like for the time being, Rich Aurilia will get the nod at third base.  Encarnacion really cooled off in May where he hit .242 with only six RBIs after driving in 24 in April.  Maybe the time off will do him some good.

Austin Kearns continues to get the job done as well.  He’s now up to 12 homeruns and he leads the team with 38 RBIs.

Just a quick update, and I’ll close this up.  The Reds scored two runs in third.  2-0 Reds.

June 7, 1976 at Three Rivers Stadium 

Pirates 5, Reds 4  (32-20)

The defending National League West Pittsburgh Pirates ended the Reds three game winning streak in a back and forth affair.  Neither team scored until the Pirates put a single run on the board in the sixth.  The Reds answered and tied the game up in the top of the seventh, but the Pirates scored three in the bottom of the seventh to take a three run lead.  The Reds then answered that with three runs of their own in the top of the eighth, only to see Will McEnaney give up a single run in the bottom of the eighth that would become the game winner.

Jack Billingham was shaky but didn’t get a decision.  He gave up four runs (three earned) on five hits and one walk with four strikeouts in seven innings of work.  The one glaring negative was that he gave up three homeruns to the Pirates.

McEnaney dropped to 1-3 on the season.  Joe Morgan hit two solo homeruns, and Pete Rose also went yard.

June 6, 1976 at Busch Stadium 

Reds 13, Cardinals 2  (32-19)

The Reds swept the Cardinals with another big hitting day.  In the entire three game series, the Reds outscored the Cards 29-5.

Backup catcher Bill Plummer had a career day.  He went three for five with a three run homerun, seven RBIs and two runs.  Tony Perez also homered and Joe Morgan went three for four with three runs, an RBI and his 21st stolen base of the season.

Pat Zachry cruised to an easy win and improved to 5-1 on the season.  He gave up a single run on four hits and three walks with two strikeouts. 

June 5, 1976 at Busch Stadium 

Reds 5, Cardinals 1  (31-19)

The Reds won their second straight at Busch Stadium behind a very strong outing by Don Gullett.  Gullett improved to 4-2 on the season and gave up only one run on six hits with one walk and eight strikeouts.

George Foster homered for the second straight day as he brought his season total up to 11.  Ken Griffey went two for four with two runs.

• I’ve always wanted to include the words spasm and clinch in a column title.  Thank God it didn’t describe diarrhea (this time).
• The Reds luck out and miss a start by Oswalt.  Chris Carpenter is dinged up.  It’s time to do some more damage in the division on the road vs. St Louis and get two games or closer to the Cardinals.
• So much for an obvious closer.  Both Weathers and Coffey looked shaky.   
• When Coffey blew the lead in the 10th, I thought to myself, “I wonder what the record for blown saves by one team in one game is?”  I’m sure it’s way more than two, but two blown leads seemed too much to overcome at the time.
• Freel really got around on that game-winning home run.  The only game I ever saw live at Minute Maid Park (then Enron Field), I saw Jason LaRue hit a monster grand slam to left field in a similar manner, only another 50 feet further.
• I guess I should look for a head shot when the Reds acquire someone new.  I was shocked to see when he came into the game that Esteban Yan was not Korean.  Now that I look at it, the Esteban part is pretty obviously hispanic.  Yan isn’t, however, that I’m aware of.

June 4, 1976 at Busch Stadium 

Reds 11, Cardinals 2  (30-19)

After two poor offensive games in the Astrodome, the Reds broke out in their series opening game agains the Cardinals.  By the end of the game, they had racked up eleven runs on eighteen hits and five of those runs came in the first inning.

George Foster hit the ball hard and went three for four with his tenth homerun of the season, four RBIs and two runs.  Tony Perez had three hits and three runs and Dave Concepcion went five for six with two RBIS and a run.

Gary Nolan improved to 4-3 on the season with the complete game.  He gave up two runs on seven hits with three strikeouts.

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