There was a blissful time when the Cincinnati Reds remembered how to hit. Elly De La Cruz was healthy and flourishing, Sal Stewart looked the part of the team’s next cornerstone in the box, Nathaniel Lowe looked like the bargain of the offseason, Spencer Steer couldn’t not get on base, and JJ Bleday was a complete revelation. It came after the team’s slow start, but for a minute this lineup looked formidable and as deep as it had been in a decade.
Perhaps that wasn’t them ‘remembering’ how to hit. Perhaps that was just as good as it was ever going to be.
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Cincinnati’s offense has hit the skids again in June, the 37 runs they’ve scored this month better only than the 36 put up by the Arizona Diamondbacks (who still managed to take two of three off Cincinnati in Great American Ball Park over the weekend). The Reds rank second to last also in average (.218) and third to last in wRC+ (86), their 14 collective doubles is better than only three teams. In a further alarming development, only three clubs have struck out more than the 112 times Cincinnati has been sat down on strikes, something that seemed not to be their calling card earlier in the year.
Keep in mind that this is how things rank despite Ke’Bryan Hayes having been sidelined through this entire period. This also coincides with TJ Friedl having been optioned, so his poor form isn’t reflected here, either.
Sadly, things also don’t appear to be on the brink of miraculously changing course in the near future.
Up next for Cincinnati on the schedule are the New York Mets. Despite their foibles early in the year, their pitching staff still ranks as the 9th best by total fWAR in the sport this year. Then, the Reds face the New York Yankees, Milwaukee Brewers, Pittsburgh Pirates, and the Brewers again over their next four series, a 13 game stretch against the clubs who, as of this morning, rank 4th, 2nd, 5th, and 2nd in terms of overall fWAR by their collective pitching staffs.
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That’s a murderer’s row of arms that Cincinnati is about to square off against, and so far they’ve been clipped by clubs who offer significantly less arm talent already.
(The Reds, for the record, rank 2nd to last on that pitching fWAR list. Only the Washington Nationals have been graded worse.)
A whole lot about Cincinnati’s offense has never woken up this year. The last half-month, though, has been some of the absolute worst of the worst.
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