Four runs in the final three innings paced the Los Angeles Dodgers over the Cincinnati Reds, 8-4, before 17,334 at Great American Ball Park.
Cincinnati continued to look like a minor league farm team against National League West division competition, losing its sixth straight game overall and dropping to a season-high 22 games below .500.
Once again, the bullpen couldn’t get the job done, allowing Los Angeles to break a 4-4 tie and score four runs over the final three innings for the win. It won’t surprise anyone that Cincinnati is last in the majors in bullpen ERA, 5.15.
In the second inning with one out, Kyle Farmer continued to feast on lefthanded pitching with a double against Tyler Anderson. Donovan Solano then stepped to the plate for the first time as a Cincinnati Red:
Reds Country, this is Donnie Barrels. @DonovanSolano17 pic.twitter.com/uJhETc3Gte
— Cincinnati Reds (@Reds) June 22, 2022
Matt Reynolds followed with a walk, and Albert Almora Jr. grounded into a force out to leave runners on first and third with two out. Aramis Garcia hit a grounder which shortstop Trea Turner threw away at first, allowing Solano to score. Reynolds then scored on a wild pitch with Jonathan India at the plate to give the home team what turned out to be a relatively brief 3-0 lead.
After Los Angeles took a 4-3 lead in the top of the fifth, Almora tied it in the bottom of the frame:
Bert, Bert, Bert, the Bert is the word. pic.twitter.com/l4xmzp9Cul
— Cincinnati Reds (@Reds) June 23, 2022
Farmer was the only Reds hitter with more than one hit — two doubles and a single to lift his batting average to .286. It was his sixth three-hit game of the year.
Reds starter Luis Castillo had the wheels fall off in the top of the fifth. Holding a 3-1 lead, Castillo allowed three hits, a walk, and hit Chris Taylor with a pitch — all of which resulted in three runs and a 4-3 Dodger lead.
Lefty Ross Detwiler pitched an eye-popping sixth inning, and came back to face lefthanded batting Freddie Freeman to lead off the seventh with the game tied at 4-4. Despite the apparent matchup advantage, Detwiler got smoked by Freeman for a long homer to right.
Joel Kuhnel then mirrored Detwiler’s performance, shutting down the Dodgers convincingly after Detwiler in the seventh, but blowing a tire in the eighth. He walked the first two hitters back to back, then surrendered a two-run scoring double to Trayce Thompson, who raised his average to .118 with the blow. Thompson eventually scored on a sacrifice fly, finishing Kuhnel’s pitching line with three runs allowed.
Art Warren finished the eighth, allowing no runs. Same in the ninth inning for Dauri Moreta in his return from Louisville.
The fans in attendance got a chance to cheer Moreta’s strikeout of Chris Taylor in the ninth. The eleventh K by Reds pitchers meant free pizza courtesy of LaRosa’s.
Los Angeles Dodgers at Cincinnati Reds
Thursday, June 23, 12:35 p.m. ET
Clayton Kershaw (4-1, 2.08 ERA) vs. Hunter Greene (3-7, 5.26 ERA)
Tom Mitsoff is a lifelong Reds fan who grew up in the Dayton suburb of Beavercreek, Ohio. He lived a teenage life atypical of most his age by prioritizing following the Reds. At one point in the 1970s and early 1980s, Tom kept complete scorecards on more than 1,000 consecutive Reds games. Now that adult life has forced him to move on from his beloved Southwest Ohio, he follows the Reds daily through MLB.TV and other online media sources, including Redleg Nation. You can follow his thoughts of 280 characters or less on Twitter: @tmitsoff
Worst Reds team in my lifetime and I am 61 years old. A Total disgrace. Everyone in the entire organization should be fired. The Castellinis should be ran out of town.
67 and I have to agree. Being bad is frustrating enough. Nobody throughout the organization gives a rat’s rear end makes it doubly so. And I’m including a number of the players in that assessment. Come on Oakland. Pull off the win and make the Reds officially the worst team in baseball.
You may say I’m a dreamer…
But I’m not the only one.
Yeah, 100 losses are not out of reach.
Oakland’s owners are in an active war to sabotage their team so they can move. Let’s envy what the reds owners can accomplish being this bad with a team only about $9 million cheaper then last year.
Not seen any comments yet about baseballs economics being the problem, because they are not. The reds owners are an incompetent mess. Andrew Friedman with the reds payroll would accomplish more then the reds owners with the dodgers payroll. That’s just a fact. Stop saying it because it gives this sad sack ownership group an excuse they don’t deserve.
https://www.baseball-reference.com/teams/CIN/ not only in YOUR lifetime but in Reds history. Worst Reds team ever (lowest W-L %) was 1934 Reds at .344 W-L %.
This Reds team is .338 W-L % so far.
56 and I have to agree too. I’d like to say that Reds are a couple of bullpen arms and an outfielder away from competing, but the reality is much worse.
77 and I also agree, I’ve been following the red since 1956, and this is the worst team and ownership group I’ve ever seen.
47 years old and I agree as well. I was very young when the 82 team of duane walker and paul householder where on the team. Injuries or not this team is terrible. It starts at the top with owernship/upper management. Bullpen is terrible, and starters well they are good yet have to pitch perfect 9 inning shut out baseball to win or throw a no hitter to win, OH WAIT….. geesh what a lost season.
I am a decade and change ahead of you. Those 1982-84 teams were legitimately in the same class as now. This said the 2022 team is on pace to be worse than the 1982 team for the lowest winning % in my lifetime.
Yes those Vern Rapp managed early 80’s teams were really bad, it is saying a lot that this team could be worse. One thing those bad 80’s teams had going for it though, was a strong farm system behind it that would lead to the multiple 2nd place finishes of the later 80’s teams, culminating in the 1990 World Series Championship team, which was mostly a home grown team.
The Reds relief corps are nothing but garbage!!!!!!
Said for how many years ? Good grief I wish they would fix it.
Worse bullpen in the majors…..you get what you pay for. Bob C the Reds owner is happy and content to ONLY have to pay the reds bullpen pitchers like shoppers going to the 99 cents store or dollar tree to pay for items there. Cheap, Cheap, Cheap!
proposed this the other night but will do so again;
Trade or DFA Pham, Drury, Castillo, Moose, Solano, Almora and yes Votto.
Play India, Farmer, Stephenson, Barerro, Senzel, Lopez, Fairchild (AAA), and Santana (AAA), Aquino and Friedl.
Ride with these guys for 80 games and let the chips fall where they may. At least we could forgive the defensive lapses and pathetic at bats from rookies and not-yet arbitration eligible players.
Close. At this point, I think I’d keep Almora & Drury and trade Senzel & Farmer. Still, I’d rather see your roster playing than the current one. But, they have to DFA Bell, Zinter, and DJ for it to matter.
The Reds absolutely need a fire sale. But the ownership has shown they are continually unwilling to pull the trigger. (although technically one should “squeeze” a trigger and not “pull” it, as that will hurt your accuracy)
But trading most of those guys listed won’t net anything of value. Votto & Moose are untradable, and Pham, Drury, Senzel, and Solano won’t bring back a prospect in a team’s top-20.
If the Reds want to get value, they need to give value.
Farmer could probably net a prospect in the 15~20 range, while both Mahle and Castillo should bring back a good package (assuming the Reds know what that looks like).
Well, Kershaw is pitching tomorrow, so Kyle Farmer and Donavan Solano might get a few singles.
Y’know, Hunter might really be on the beam tomorrow and shut the Dodgers down and…..well, probably not.
The top part of the batting order got NO hits, outside of a meaningless double by Drury.
Don’t forget the great Senzel should be back in the line-up.
Eleven strikeouts. Free Pizza. Yippee! How about them walks coming around to score once again? Five (5) walks for Reds pitchers, at least 3 of them came around to score, that should be worth a free soda.
It’s time to align payroll with expectations and expectations have hit an all-time low. Shed as much payroll as fast as it can be unloaded. Might as well play an all-minor league roster at the major league level to match the minor league results.
The real sad sad story is last year, had Reds owner and Reds management invested in the bullpen and brought in some reliable guys from the start of the year, with the team the Reds had….they could have made the playoffs and possibly did something in the postseason, giving their starting pitching. Now, we will never know.
That’s the same word I’m getting from friends and family around the country. I’m in Texas, long gone from my Cincinnati years. They say “The Reds were so close last year, why not spend a dime and push it through?” They don’t understand, I doubt many do. I wonder what the owners and Bull Krall are actually thinking. I mean, the team they contrived this year is really, really bad It’s not the injuries. You can’t dump it on Hunter Greene’s 22 y.o. shoulders to make it interesting. 2024! As if….. What do the Castellinis say to their golfing buddies? “We’ve got the worst team in baseball. On purpose.”
The Castellinis probably blame it on “the baseball people”. You know, like Mr. Red. He’s a baseball people. And Krull; he’s scary. Or Krall. Whatever. It’s not their fault. They don’t make trades and stuff like that like the Baseball people do. It’s the Baseball people that do this stuff.
It’s kind of funny, in a way, how stupid a lot of Bob Castellini’s blather sounds now when you re-read things he said when he took over being the managing owner of the partnership. I think it’s kind of a masochistic obsession to follow the team now. We can hope for a better team in a couple of years, and maybe it happens. And maybe it doesn’t. I still clearly see the 2015-2017 teams, where Joey Votto had really good years, and they were still lousy. DFA Moustakas? You’ve got to be kidding! They owe him a lot of money and HE WILL PLAY for the Reds until his contract runs out. That’s how the Castellini braintrust rolls.
Yeah, it WOULD be really cool to trade off/jettison all the older players, go all in on youth, and see what happens. At least the fans could honestly say that they think the team would be a LOT better in a year or two. It can’t get much worse….can it?
This game captures Castillo’s career in a nutshell. Almost always suffers from lack of run support, but they jump out 3-0 and he has to be fully locked in mentally vs the Dodgers. Whats he do? Wiggles out of 1 jam and gets to the 5th leading 3-1, but walks/hits guys and loses the lead and can’t get past the 5th. Which is a guaranteed loss with our pen. He had to go atleast 6 and allow 3 or less and we probably still would’ve lost, but he would’ve done his job as a quality veteran pitcher. Move on and get what you can get. 3.70 with his stuff is not acceptable. He’s mentally weak.
Worst Reds team I’ve ever seen when you consider how bad Louisville is and how bleak the near future looks.
“mentally weak?” Do you know him personally to make such a statement? Come on Indy, I enjoy your post and comments, but I disagree with that statement..
The two Dodger rallies off Castillo were mirror images of each other. Without the back to back occurrence of a walk followed by HBP in each of them, they likely come to naught. In the process, Castillo ran up his pitch count and was done after 5 innings which made what followed all too predictable given the Reds pen.
Said it a few weeks back.Your so called best pitcher has to show it.Walks and a hit batter put 4 guys on base in the 5th.Thats what a rookie may do but not a veteran.You can see it coming almost every game.He will ask for and get more then Reds will pay.Trade him now and move on
If you were not entertained by this game, I am sorry. The Reds went up early 3-0, and when the Dodgers went ahead 4-3, it was Albert Almora Jr. that homered and tied the game in the 5th. The Dodgers have the magic going and scored 8 runs for the second straight night. A 4 run deficit is difficult to overcome in 2 late innings. I’m hoping the Reds have saved enough for game 3… As the great Yogi Berra said, 90% of the game is mental and the other half is physical. The Dodgers are playing like they expect to win. They got the mojo working. The Reds can fold, or they can come out like they did against the Cardinals… Win or lose, these Reds are worth supporting, because they are playing ball to the best of their ability.
It is ironic and frustrating that the Dodgers have seemed to bring out the best of the Reds. It hasn’t been enough against them but probably would have won additional games versus the likes of the teams the Reds played during the run up to this series. At least we haven’t seen the slapstick Little League reminiscent plays which were becoming a Reds hallmark. They have lost simply because the Dodgers team was better.
Here is a breakdown of Red’s attendance
https://twitter.com/heygingersaurus/status/1539034539351281665?s=21&t=fUK82UI49Uo6ENMw8xhspQ
Since Great American Ball Park opened in 2003, the Reds have only averaged over 30,000 a game twice, in 2013 and 2014. This was in the middle of their play-off runs.
This season average attendance is almost half of what is was in 2014, with the Reds drawing only 16,900 per game.
Keep in mind this report is tickets sold and not fannies in the seats, which of course means the numbers are inflated. Granted school has been out just a short time.
Team performance is often a lagging indicator for attendance. So, if you win a World Series, it may take another season before you see a significant increase in attendance. Conversely, if you start tanking it will take awhile before poor play will impact your attendance.
Next season, we are likely to see a much more negative impact when it comes to home attendance figures.
This creates a real problem for Bob Castellini. The less ownership spends, the fewer games the Reds win. This results in fewer people attending games. As they say, it takes money to make money.
The Reds want to have it both ways. A low payroll and a winning team. I realize it does happen, but you don’t have a margin for error. Every decision you make, has to be a good one.
Phil Castillini: “where are they going to go?”
Reds fan: “anywhere besides the ball park”
Shake things up tomorrow against Kershaw to avoid a sweep. All Righty Lineup of India, Senzel, Pham, Drury, Farmer, Solano, Almora, Okey and Reynolds. Try to build some confidence in Senzel by moving him up in the order. I’m thinking Bell won’t, so maybe India, Drury, Pham, Farmer, Solano, Almora, Senzel, Okey and Reynolds a more likely lineup.
I get up early and watch a little KBO (Korean league). Kiwoom Heroes have a young 22 yr old righty pitching named An Woo-Jin. Just got clocked at 158 kph (98 mph). He’s 6’4 202 and has a 1.11 whip. 81 innings, 62 hits, 1 hr allowed, 94 Ks, and 28 walks. Asian pitchers don’t just pound heaters like a Tyler Mahle either. They develop breaking stuff first.
Kiwoom also has the best hitter in the league too. A young lefty hitting OFer at .344 with 12 Hrs. I noticed him in 2020 during Covid when KBO was on ESPN. He’s 23 I think. He’s no Shogo.
Get out there and make an offer. Either one could start for the Reds tomorrow
What channel or streaming source is KBO available through? Thanks,
I got my angst over the Reds off by watching the back end of game 4 of the Stanley Cup.
The game went to overtime (sudden death). I don’t know when I have ever seen such fast and furious action. It kept on coming for about 12 clock minutes played in probably 15-20 minutes of real time (no commercial breaks. Just a 3-5 minute breather at the first whistle after the 10 minute mark).
The officials were struggling to keep up and out of the way of the players. Fittingly neither the officials nor anyone on either team realized for several seconds that the winning goal had been scored because the puck was literally lodged in the back of the net atop the in-goal camera housing.
Then as if this game and finish needed any postscript, eagle-eyed video folks realized too late that when the winning goal had scored, both teams had an extra man on the ice.
Yeah. Phil C, there are other sports things to watch.
That was a good game. TB seemed to wilt in the overtime and could not keep up. Play-off Hockey is so different than regular season Hockey.
I watched the Reds first Inning or so, then alternated between the Cards and Braves.
Have you ever seen officials getting caught in the play and unable to get in front of it so often? I haven’t. At times it seemed like the players were intentionally trying to use the officials as picks or screens like happens in football with the Umpire over the middle of the field.
Then another final irony was that the Ref was in position to make the call on the winning goal but lost sight of the puck or just presumed the Tampa goalie had pulled another one out of the air and the puck was under him.
Enjoyed the hockey, particular as an Avs’ fan, but both teams are exceptional and the two best teams advanced to the SCF and the level of play has been riveting. A nice diversion from bad Reds’ baseball. Because ESPN’s talking heads don’t do the game justice, I spend period breaks watching baseball, and last night it was Brew Crew v Cardinals during intermissions. With the awful state of the Reds (and Tigers in the AL, nearly as bad but at least with a core of developing talent), I will be having major withdrawal pains when hockey ends soon. More time fishing and less time around the tube, I suspect…(“What am I gonna do?” I have ideas, Phil.)
Dodgers are good.Yanks are better then them by a wide margin.They will mercy rule us every game.I keep reading about Farmer and how he is holding this team together so why don’t we just make him player manager.May only lose 97 instead of 107.Maybe other teams won’t laugh so hard when they play us and more importantly Barrera may get to play some.
Seems like the entire season is just foreplay for a Yanks and Dodgers World Series.
The Reds and Oakland , KC, Arizona, Detroit, Miami, Pittsburg, and Baltimore should all be placed into their own league and only be required to play one another. Salaries would be limited to no more than one hundred million collectively per year. Essentially AAAA.
While I know this will never happen it is unrealistic to think that the Reds can compete with teams with payrolls over 200 million. We are nothing more than a farm team and proving ground for player development for those teams. Kind of like the relationship between the NCAA and NBA.
Crawling comes ahead of walking and walking ahead of running. There is no reason why the Reds shouldn’t be competitive in their division or for a Wild Card spot in the new setup. If they got in, three top starting pitchers, a couple of reliable relievers and even a just competent offense could go a long way in a playoff scenario. Those components are not outside the Reds reach.
More money makes the margin for error larger but does not guarantee ultimate success, but money also means those teams are more likely to be in races every season. However, less money does not disqualify a team if well spent with the intent to compete.
Hey, I kinda like that idea. Split MLB into A league (Yanks, Dodgers, any other team over $xxx million in payroll) who buy up all the best veterans, and B league (Oakland, Baltimore, and the rest) who rely primarily on their farm system and has beens. Have play offs of the best A teams and the best B teams, then let winners of A and B play each other. A team should best B team in best of 7, but hey B team could win it all. How exciting would that be.
Changing the 2 leagues into a big market and small market maybe what’s needed to save baseball. This would not be any different then the soccer leagues in Europe. You can then have relegation in which the top 2-3 teams in the “2nd tier league” get moved up and the lower 2-3 teams in the “premier” league get demoted every year
This could be a plan. I wasn’t really following football (soccer) that closely back in the day; but, I believe the Premier League came into being when the top tier teams said they were starting their own league versus being just the FA top tier; and, left it to the FA whether they wanted to cooperate in the relegation scheme (which of course was already being used by the FA).
I have been recording every game for years except when on vacation. This is the first year where I have completely lost interest in watching them play. It’s not just that the team is bad(they are) but how they got their due to ownership and bad trades.It is just too much. Taking a break until some kind of shakeup in management or God willing, ownership.
We are in 100% agreement. I forget to record games now. Never used to but what’s the point? I’ve lost all interest as well. I feel for the players but not management. Organization needs an overhaul and it starts with the Ownership. Good luck to us.
When do we admit that Kyle Farmer is pretty dang* good?
For some they never will because they’re too in love with a kid in aaa who’s batting a lofty .216 and a creer .190s hitter in the majors
The Reds need to evaluate Farmer with the same cold eye that they should evaluate every player. (Alas, they don’t evaluate any player very astutely.) Farmer has HUGE platoon splits. Against RH pitching, he slashes .243/.304/.303. Against LH pitching, he slashes 397/.446/.776.
Farmer crushes LH pitching, but he is not even mediocre at anything else. He is a bad defensive shortstop, because he just lacks the fast-twitch athleticism that you want to have at that position. He does not really have a shortstop’s arm. He is a slow runner, both defensively and on the basepaths.
The proper use of Farmer’s talent (crushing lefties) would be to platoon him with Joey Votto at first base. Votto can’t hit much at all anymore, and has actually hit a hair better against LH this year than RH, but over the past few years, he has not hit LH pitching well at all. The Reds aren’t going to do that, because they don’t take a cold, hard look at reality. They think that they have to play Votto every day, and Farmer is on management’s good side, so they keep trotting him out against RH starters at shortstop.
The failure to understand reality is at the core of ownership’s collapse. Moustakas is bad and is in the way; Schrock is the far better option at third base. DFA Moustakas. Senzel is a flop, if not an Uber-Dud. His .511 OPS is far worse than anything Billy Hamilton posted; Senzel is Hamilton without the speed or defense. Senzel has an impossible .367 OPS against LH pitching. I think that Senzel can still be optioned to AAA. If so, they need to do that, today. If not, then he should be DFA’d, today. Take a flyer on Lorenzo Cedrola or Isiah Gilliam to take Senzel’s place. How could they possibly be worse?
Somebody will take Pham in a trade. Do it. Castillo sunk to the occasion last night, with walks and HBPs and 20-pitch innings. Trade him; he doesn’t want to be here. Get younger and get faster — now, not next year.
Bell just isn’t the guy, either, nor is Zinter as hitting coach. I wonder who would want Bell’s job, because there is a lame duck GM in Krall and likely a lame duck ownership group.
Farmer is a top 10 ss on offense and defense but feel free to keep making things up
bg01, speaking of making things up, show me a website that ranks Farmer inside the top 10 shortstops.https://www.justbaseball.com/mlb/top-10-mlb-shortstops-for-2022/ Not even honorable mention….
I’m cynically convinced the Reds are holding onto Farmer because they want him to be their lone All-Star selection. They love feel-good stories…..mistakenly thinking they correlate to more fan engagement……more than winning baseball games. Or maybe just to save face as he/Drury/Ashcraft are the only guys on the active roster with a WAR over 1. This wouldn’t be the first time, either. We all know why they held onto Frazier in 2015.
Keeping Farmer for holding a team 23 games under .500 together in the clubhouse. Makes me laugh. So that is now the prerequisite for success, having a cohesive clubhouse on a team destined for continued futility. We keep hearing about “when we get healthy”, who exactly are they waiting for?
Watching the game last night, and it’s the middle of the 8th . Dodgers just scored 3. I’m almost 75 and my eyelids are getting heavy. Think I will just close my eyes till they come back from commercial. WOW, what’s this. Johnny Temple lines a soft shot into left center for a single. Vada shoots a screamer just inside first base that rolls all the way into the corner. JT scores and Vada goes into 3rd standing. Gus Bell hits a 2 hopper to 2nd. Vada scores. 1 out, and Frankie Robinson steps in. First pitch is a shot to deep left. It bounces off the laundry. But just misses the Siebler suit sign. Ed Bailey strolls toward home and Huh,what Huh cough.What’s up dear. Wish you hadn’t woke me, I was reliving a wonderful era in Reds baseball. Oh Geez another Reds reliever game, maybe I will just try closing my eyes again.
No Joey and no 3M in the line-up today. RoY is on DH duty. And we do have a Chris Okey sighting.
Senzel has a .367 OPS against LH pitching. He’d be better off not taking a bat to the plate against Kershaw, and hoping for a walk.
Senzel can’t even successfully injure himself anymore. We are stuck with watching him “play.”
Farmer is a good player on the worst team in baseball.Barrero is a 5 tool player that has 60 at bats at the big league level.Both can play and every day on my team but it’s not happening because it appears nobody wants to tell Farmer that Barrero is the shortstop going forward.Amazing to me that on a team as bad as the Reds that this is in issue.Find a place for both to play that best suits their skill level.For Barrera to field a grounder in the outfield that he would have fielded in the infield is dumb
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