The ghost of Buster Posey

The Reds and Cubs split an evenly played four-game series. In most circumstances, that would be fine. This weekend, it felt like David Bell’s team needed to win three to keep their flickering postseason hopes alive. For five, even six innings this afternoon, it seemed like the Reds were going to do just that. Luis Castillo’s fastball/changeup mix held the Cubs mighty bats in check much as his teammates Trevor Bauer and Sonny Gray had the previous two games. The best part of the Reds bullpen was readily available.

But the Cubs, annoyingly, are good. Especially their batters. They don’t need the help of a two-out Jason Heyward “single” that traveled 97 feet of the infield, hit 70.6 mph with a NEGATIVE 51º launch angle. 11% hit probability. But hey they got it. And calamity ensued.

Michael Lorenzen went from hero to goat in the course of a week. That’s the fate of most relief pitchers. Just ask David Hernandez. Again, they are relievers for a reason. When the Reds bullpen got off to a great start in 2019, we were pleasantly surprised. After all, it was the same middling gang as last year. But because we’re fans we get intoxicated by anything good that happens. We came to assume top shelf had become the natural state of the Reds relief corps. In reality, there was little reason to believe they were any more than average. And — warning, logic to follow — for the bullpen to end up as average after a great start you suffer days like today.

Suffer, indeed.

Lorenzen threw an 84.2 mph slider to Kris Bryant. I don’t know why he did. Slider isn’t his best pitch, or second-best or third-best. He throws it so rarely — it’s his sixth-most used pitch — I also don’t know why Bryant seemed so ready for it. He couldn’t have been looking slider. Maybe he was expecting Lorenzen’s cutter and was behind. Regardless, it was center-plate and low in the zone. A perfect hitting spot in the day of upper-cut swings.

The ball traveled 402 feet and banged around near the ghost of Buster Posey’s dagger in the left-center bleachers. By the time it came to rest you had the sense the game, and perhaps the 2019 chase, was over.

Yes, people are saying Bryant’s ball landed next to Posey’s. Actually, it’s just me saying it and it’s a metaphor. Not as much was on the line today, of course. But having witnessed both first-hand from the same seat, I can testify to that old familiar feeling of deflation and deja doom.

Note similarity.

Sigh.

A few mundane game notes:

• Joey Votto was called out on strikes three times today and each ball was out of the strike zone. (Sleuthing and graphic by C. Trent Rosecrans.) If you think Votto should be swinging at those pitches I’m not hiring you to be the batting coach or broadcaster.
• Aristides Aquino did not swoop in with a cape and save the Reds. He did single and walk in four PA.
• Fans missed free pizza by one strikeout. /shakes fist at Jon Lester for hitting those two pointless line drives/
• Eugenio Suarez blasted his 33rd homer of the season into the right-center bleachers
• Luis Castillo struck out eight and walked just one
• Kyle Farmer made two outstanding defensive plays at second base, this was one of them

Nobody:

Guys named Kyle: #BornToBaseball pic.twitter.com/uRGEPRa6wH

— Cincinnati Reds (@Reds) August 11, 2019

The Reds 1969 throwback uniforms were awesome. Brian Erts has authored an extraordinary series on this year’s celebration of Reds unis at Redleg Nation. Highest recommendation.

Reds Most Valuable Players