Here we are at the nominal season halfway point and my beloved Cincinnati Reds are still mired deep near the bottom of our division. They have been sometimes spectacular (like when they swept the Yankees in the Bronx) and sometimes abysmal (like when they got swept by the sputtering Tigers on the very next series). Sure we’ve had lots of key injuries this season but we were told the deep well of overlapping young talents on the team could compensate for that. Not so much so far.

But the good news is that even with all the bad news we are still in the hunt for a Wild Card spot, out by just three games. We are still an exciting team to watch with exceptional rookie talents, but way too many rookie mistakes. I try to listen to as many Reds radio games as possible but I hear too often: “what a great start from X pitcher, except for one or two bad tosses” (that lost us the game). More consistent pitching efforts would keep those throws down in the zone to be a zapped ground out to Elly De La Cruz instead of out of the park. At least we have the spectacular young talent of Elly De La Cruz. But we need his over enthusiasm to be honed to finer skills and the rest of the team to level up to his tier. There is still a lot of baseball left and I am confident we will be in the post season this year. Go Reds!