What it looks like

[redsrbetter]

No doubt we are all dissapointed in this offseason. Many words should not have been taken as truth. My faith in the FO has declined. Many Reds fans feel the same way and it is for teh right reasons.

So lets take a brief look at what our future holds:

Narron's lineup:
Freel RF
Phillips 2B
Griffey CF
Encarnacion 3B
Dunn LF
Hatteberg 1B
Ross C
Gonzalez SS
Pitcher

Bench:
Denorfia OF
Hamilton OF
Castro IF
Conine IF/OF
Valentin C
Moeller C


Rotation:
Harang
Arroyo
Milton
Lohse
Belisle/Ramirez
(Bailey mid-season)

Bullpen:
Belisle/Ramirez
Bray
Coffey
Cormier
Majewski
Stanton CL
Weathers CL

We have some bright spots. Its good to see Freel with an everyday position with good backup OF to give him his spell when needed. I would hope Phillips and EdE can continue to improve. Griffey will be another step slower, but Deno will be ready to go when Griffey can't. The bad thing here is Griffey playing CF and batting 3rd in the lineup. Once again, his presence will do more harm than good because he is being used as a stud 21 year old instead of who he really is. Dunn will be Dunn. Hatteberg will be the most underrated player on the team because he doesn't have much pop. Much like Sean Casey was, Hatteberg will do more of the same but a notch better in OBP due to his consistancy in BB. We all have high hopes for Ross, but hopefully they are not too high. He and Valentin will have similar years and definitely should platoon vs L/R respectively. Gonzalez plays defense.

The best starting rotation we have seen in years and there are only two good arms there. Those two were sensationally underrated last year and will continue to win a lot of games for the Reds next year. The rest, is a joke. But I do look forward to seeing Lohse work. He has nasty stuff and I am hoping he can be a bright spot that seems to occur almost never for the Reds as far as pitchers go.

The bullpen his highly bolstered IMO. If Majewski and Bray can live up to their potential and be the guys Krivsky traded for, we will be solid in the pen. The closers tandem looks pretty weak though and I hope that changes real soon. Would be nice to see Bray or Coffey take over this year and Majewski could fit in a set-up role.

All in all do you guys see this team as a contender? We would have to see some surprises in our young guys like Lohse, Belisle, Bray, Majewski...
A great recreation year from Hamilton would be nice too. So should we be optimistic or should we hang our heads in shame this year?

[MO reds fan]

I hate Dunn batting 5th. You wonder why doesn't have high RBI numbers for the amount of Homeruns he hit. I know he strikes out a ton but he can hit it out any pitch.

[DravenX]

I don't consider Encarnacion as clean-up guy.

[NFLman2033]

you know, I wouldnt hate that lineup if we had gotten another SP.. but the fact that we didn't improve our SP, really makes me hate this... not to mention i hate the bench a lot, and still hate the though of Weathers being our closer.. in fact I just downright hate the whole thing, I think I am going to try my best to not even pay any attention to baseball this year..

yeah right good luck with that

[MO reds fan]

Are we in agreement that we overachieved last year? If we come back down to earth I see the reds winning 70 or so games. It's basically the same team as last year. If Bray and Majewski pitch good then we could possibly push for a wild card.

[redsrbetter]

Yep, I agree they definitely played over their heads last season while the rest of the division played far worse than expected. We cannot sit back and expect that to happen again.

I think the lineup can still put up some runs. It is not as strong as in the past, but it still can potentially be potent. We have plenty of power still and a few guys who know how to get on base. Freel playing everyday is a sure upgrade to the leadoff spot and he will provide the spark he always has.

I think there are a lot of young players on this team who have to put a lot of pressure on themselves in order for this team to be good. Imagine EdE or Phillips declining from their showing last season. Or if Majewski, Coffey, and Bray don't meet expectations, this team will have its problems.

I really don't think the success of this team falls on Dunn or Griffey anymore. It is the rotation and hopes that Harang and Arroyo can pitch like last season and rely on the young players to step up and play some quality baseball.

[NFLman2033]

Are we in agreement that we overachieved last year? If we come back down to earth I see the reds winning 70 or so games. It's basically the same team as last year. If Bray and Majewski pitch good then we could possibly push for a wild card.

absolutely, I said a number of times last year that we were overachieving, there is no way guys like Phillips, Ross, Arroyo, and maybe Hatteberg produce the numbers they did last year.

[love_that_reefer]

There are still some pitchers out there for the picking like Ohka, Weaver and some others that are much better than Lohse.

[Slyder]

There are still some pitchers out there for the picking like Ohka, Weaver and some others that are much better than Lohse.

They aren't "much better" than Lohse. Its a push between them. Weaver had a couple good starts in the playoffs but howd he do in Anaheim or St. Louis leading up to that? He blew as bad/some would say even worse than Eric Milton. Someone's going to pay him big bucks and regret it when he returns to earth.

[MO reds fan]

Encarnacion could be the wild card this year... I think he has the potential to be a superstar someday.

If Freel and Phillips play everday, like they should, this team will be ok.

[love_that_reefer]

I find Weaver to be a much better option than Lohse. Duncan fixed Weaver's mechanics in the last part of the season and it showed and then he was great in the playoffs. Lohse blew up at season's end and just isn't as good as Weaver. Ohka is coming off a injury riddled season but he has far better stuff than Lohse. Armas Jr., Bruce Chen, Mark Redman, John Thomson and even Jamey Wright are looking like better options. All these guys are available and will add dpeth to that staff. Losers go to the pen.

[redsrbetter]

Those names mentioned sound solid and I wouldn't mind having them pitch for us, but not over Lohse. Milton, on the other hand would be a good point to start replacing. I would much rather have those guys over Milton any day.

[love_that_reefer]

Milton makes too much to replace. I mean both aren't good but you do need that lefty in your rotation. Looks like the Pirates are really going after Ohka who is in my opinion the best available starting pitcher outside Clemens.

[NFLman2033]

no at this point, I would rather keep the crap we have then to over pay for more crap pitching

[MO reds fan]

All of the above guys mentioned aren't going to help enough to win anything. I think we should just stick with what we got and play it out.