ONE MO' THING, 6/21/11 EDITION.


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THE REDS TWEETUP IS TEN DAYS AWAY.
It's July 1st.  Reds v. Indians.  Great American Ballpark.  Here's everything you need to know. 

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A FEW MO' THINGS, 6/21/11 EDITION


Programming Notes: No radio today.  None tomorrow.  Gonna go watch grown men play baseball in the afternoon, moving our weekly chat to 9:30am tomorrow.  I'm on 700WLW Thursday and Friday afternoon in what will be more social experiment than quality radio.

Oh yeah, real quick.....FOLLOW ME ON TWITTER.

Thank you.

This news takes precedence over Reds v. Yankees.  Actually, this news take precedence over Bengals v. Steelers, UC v. XU, Stones v. Beatles, Tressel v. the truth, Tiger Woods v. sex, Ben Roethlisberger v. NOW, Huggins v. a field sobriety test, or any other head-to-head matchup worth discussing.

This news is big....

Yuengling is coming to Ohio.

I've never had children.  I've never experienced major professional success.  I've never won anything.  I've never gotten life-altering good news that caused my eyes to well up with sweet tears of joy.

Until today.

This must be what it felt like when prohibition was lifted.  I feel the way Art Schlichter would if the US made it legal to swindle people's money and gamble with it.   No longer do I have to feel like some South American drug runner every time I drive back from Pennsylvania.  Now, I'll be able to buy and consume Yuengling when I want, likely leading to even worse decision-making than I've already exhibited in my first 33+ years.  Mike Brown could announce he was selling the Bengals to a Steinbrenner/Cuban conglomerate and I wouldn't be this giddy.

I feel like rioting.  Not we-just-lost-game-seven-of-the-Stanley-Cup-Finals-let's-burn-down-the-city rioting, but UK-just-beat-Carolina-to-advance-to-the-Final-Four-and-there's-still-daylight-left-so-let's-burn-a-couch rioting.

(As an aside, to my coworkers in charge of such things....I need to be the official Clear Channel Cincinnati spokesperson for Yuengling when it makes its arrival.  They need advertising and I need to be the guy.  This has to happen.)

Interleague issues.  The Reds are now 1-6 against the AL after last night's 5-3 loss to the Yankees.  Ivan Nova was really, really good.  The Reds hitters never, ever made any adjustments, hit the ball out of the infield once against him, and pretty much folded after Votto's DP ball in the first.

The Reds have scored a whopping seven runs in four games, with Cooperstown-bound aces like Jo Jo Reyes, Brandon Morrow, Carlos Villanueva, and now Nova, shutting them down.  That quartet, by the way, has a collective career record of 60-72, with a 4.56 ERA.

The Reds meanwhile, continue to get almost no production from 44% of the lineup (including the pitcher), continue to play two offensive zeroes at short while getting substandard production at third and nothing sustainable in left field.  This was true in April.  It was the case in May.  It's the deal in June.  And will be in July, August, and September in all likelihood. 

There's a lot about this team I really like, and the recent uptick in the starting pitching performances have kept this team in the race, but I simply do not know how you win a division when you get nothing from so many.

-Chris Heisey is 2 for 17 with six whiffs since we restarted the "he should play more" bandwagon a week ago.  And he looked really good kicking around that ball in left field in the first last night.

-Lotta Yankee fans last night, which is fine, and to be expected.  But the Yankee jersey with the name on the back doesn't work. 

-How did the Yankees let Joey Votto get away?

-Speaking of revisiting Reds/Yankee draft mistakes, let's look back at 1992.  This piece yesterday looked back at the team's decision to take Chad Mottola ahead of Jeter that year.

I say Derek Jeter would've never played for the Reds.

Jeter came the Majors in 1995 as a late-season callup for the Yankees.  He was 21 years-old.  The next season, he took over at shortstop in the Bronx, won the AL's Rookie of the Year Award, hit a Jeffery-Maier aided homer that helped the Yankees win the American League pennant, and was a key factor in New York's winning their first World Series since 1996.

Let's put him on the Reds, or at least in the Reds organization.

In 1995, the Reds had a shortstop, and he was pretty good.  Barry Larkin was NL MVP that year, leading my favorite Reds team of all time to the playoffs.  In '96, he went 30/30.  He was an All-Star both years, a Gold Glove winner both years, and after his MVP season the Reds signed him to a four year, $16.5 million contract extension.

That '95 team made some trades...sending Deion Sanders and a bunch of other dudes to San Francisco for Dave Burba, Darren Lewis and Mark Portugal.  Among the players they dealt was a former first round pick in Dave McCarty (he was actually drafted by the Twins)  They also traded for David Wells, sending to Detroit their 1994 first round pick CJ Nitkowski, among others.

That 1995 roster was in flux all season....they signed Tim Belcher, then traded him.  They added Mike Remlinger, took a flier on Frank Viola, and even yanked Mariano Duncan off waivers in August.  Jim Bowden was dealing all year.

And that's why Derek Jeter never would've played for the Reds.  With shortstop being held down by one future Hall of Famer, they probably would've dealt another in an effort to win in 1995 or 1996 (The '96 Reds were perpetually 4.5 games out first.  It became a running joke in my house, deflecting the derision I took for posting a 2.2 GPA my freshman year at UD).   Jim Bowden loved to make deals, rarely gave much thought to the future (in the mid 90s) and would've surely included Jeter in any worthwhile.  Jim Bowden would've traded Derek Jeter for immediate help.  He would've been applauded for it then, mocked for it now, but I say even had the Reds drafted Derek Jeter in 1992, he never would have played an inning for them.

-The American League is kicking the hell out of the National League.  Here's a look at some reasons why.

-This person is not very worldly.

-Ozzie Guillen continues his awesomeness.


-Gotta be honest with you, I thought Amy Winehouse was dead.

-Man, I hate it when those damn Facebook hackers tell one of my bosses off.

-That one dude from Curb Your Enthusiasm is no fan of LeBron James.

-After a great NBA Finals, a compelling NBA Playoffs, and a phenomenal regular season....we have the most uninspiring NBA Draft I can remember on Thursday night.

It's just a bad class of players entering a league which could be completely dark next season.

Speaking of which, if you ever want to just randomly taunt me, send me this.

-This isn't hilarious, but it has Katrina Bowden, and I like Katrina Bowden, so watch it.