Sorry about the long delay between posts. I got lazy, I did.
I'm a member of a chat room that revolves around the Cincinnati Bengals and their ineptitude over the last 12 seasons, since mike brown (I won't deign to capitalize his name, he hasn't proven his value as a proper noun) took over the team from his late father, Paul. Paul Brown, for those who don't know, was considered an innovator by truly incorporating the forward pass into his game plan, and is beloved in Cleveland like nobody's business.
Now, you might think that this post is going to be an opportunity to rail on mike brown and the fact that the Bengals haven't had a winning season since 1990, when they went to the playoffs, lost to the Oakland Raiders, and ended Bo Jackson's pro football career. But you'd be wrong.
Most of the members of this Bengals message board, mikebrownsucks.com, are from Cincinnati. This is understandable. Thus, these guys and occasional gal are often huge fans of the Reds as well, and the Reds have shown themselves recently to be a lot like the Bengals: they have a payroll of 60 million dollars, well below the league average, and they don't win nearly enough to keep the fans happy. Also in parallel to the Bengals, they have a pretty new house. Further, they have several angry fan websites: FireBobBoone.com and CarlLindnerSucks.com both come to mind.
The reason that the Reds' payroll is so low is not that their players are all young guns out of their farm systems, who show great promise and poor financial minds. That is part of it, but that's not THE reason. THE reason behind that payroll is that Carl Lindner, who is the owner of the Reds (and Chiquita Banana, which is how he made his fortunes) told his General Manager (Jim Bowden) to spend no more than 60 million dollars on the ballclub. The result is that Bowden managed to obtain some hitters, and some very decent closers. The starting rotation, however, is the worst in the National League, and in all of major league baseball second only to the Detroit Tigers in terms of futility. The Tigers' problems are different from the Reds', by the way.
Now, you might take this time to point out that rather than pick on mike brown, I have instead opted to pick on Carl Lindner. A reasonable assumption, but wrong. Lindner may be a dick for only allowing a 60 million dollar payroll, but whatever. It's his money, and the closers are managing to do well enough to hold the team in games. As I write this, the Reds are only out of first place (behind the Cubs and Cardinals) by 5.5 games, certainly a margin that can be made up. I'm instead going to rant about the fans, who have begun posting things like "The Reds are Finished," and going on diatribes about how the fact that the team is 3.5 games back of the Cardinals (which they were at the time) is a sign that the Reds can't hope to ever win even so much as a wild card slot.
Now wait just a second. That's quite a defeatist view if ever there was one: the team hasn't yet played half of their games, and you're already calling them dead because they remain mired in contention for a playoff berth? Isn't that a little harsh? They certainly won't win the World Series or anything, but I'd hardly call them finished.
The underlying reason behind this attitude, of course, is the Bengals. Once the NFL season is half over, it's usually pretty obvious that the Bengals will not go to the playoffs. As a matter of fact, one of the safest bets (sometimes paying only 2-1) in Las Vegas has been that the Bengals will not be a .500 team. So the fans naturally take a fatalist attitude towards their football team of choice. The problem is when they extend this attitude towards the Reds. It's hardly fair to the players on the Reds franchise, it's not particularly fair to Bob Boone, the manager (who holds the second-worst winning percentage among active managers, it should be noted - the guy's an idiot), and it's not really fair to the GM. Yes, the owner is a tightwad. You can't hope to spend 60 million dollars on an entire major league roster and still expect to win games. But Bowden has managed to assemble at least a better team than he had any right to build...
Sometimes I get the impression that fans from a certain city really do blow. Philadelphia fans, for example, have been known to throw batteries at Santa Claus. But this is a little more insidious...the fans, instead of saying, "the team sucks," are saying instead, "the team cannot hope to pull itself back together," when in reality the team is not broken. It's not right, it's not fair, it's not a well-informed decision, and it makes me glad I'm a Giants fan. Hoo-rah.
I'm a member of a chat room that revolves around the Cincinnati Bengals and their ineptitude over the last 12 seasons, since mike brown (I won't deign to capitalize his name, he hasn't proven his value as a proper noun) took over the team from his late father, Paul. Paul Brown, for those who don't know, was considered an innovator by truly incorporating the forward pass into his game plan, and is beloved in Cleveland like nobody's business.
Now, you might think that this post is going to be an opportunity to rail on mike brown and the fact that the Bengals haven't had a winning season since 1990, when they went to the playoffs, lost to the Oakland Raiders, and ended Bo Jackson's pro football career. But you'd be wrong.
Most of the members of this Bengals message board, mikebrownsucks.com, are from Cincinnati. This is understandable. Thus, these guys and occasional gal are often huge fans of the Reds as well, and the Reds have shown themselves recently to be a lot like the Bengals: they have a payroll of 60 million dollars, well below the league average, and they don't win nearly enough to keep the fans happy. Also in parallel to the Bengals, they have a pretty new house. Further, they have several angry fan websites: FireBobBoone.com and CarlLindnerSucks.com both come to mind.
The reason that the Reds' payroll is so low is not that their players are all young guns out of their farm systems, who show great promise and poor financial minds. That is part of it, but that's not THE reason. THE reason behind that payroll is that Carl Lindner, who is the owner of the Reds (and Chiquita Banana, which is how he made his fortunes) told his General Manager (Jim Bowden) to spend no more than 60 million dollars on the ballclub. The result is that Bowden managed to obtain some hitters, and some very decent closers. The starting rotation, however, is the worst in the National League, and in all of major league baseball second only to the Detroit Tigers in terms of futility. The Tigers' problems are different from the Reds', by the way.
Now, you might take this time to point out that rather than pick on mike brown, I have instead opted to pick on Carl Lindner. A reasonable assumption, but wrong. Lindner may be a dick for only allowing a 60 million dollar payroll, but whatever. It's his money, and the closers are managing to do well enough to hold the team in games. As I write this, the Reds are only out of first place (behind the Cubs and Cardinals) by 5.5 games, certainly a margin that can be made up. I'm instead going to rant about the fans, who have begun posting things like "The Reds are Finished," and going on diatribes about how the fact that the team is 3.5 games back of the Cardinals (which they were at the time) is a sign that the Reds can't hope to ever win even so much as a wild card slot.
Now wait just a second. That's quite a defeatist view if ever there was one: the team hasn't yet played half of their games, and you're already calling them dead because they remain mired in contention for a playoff berth? Isn't that a little harsh? They certainly won't win the World Series or anything, but I'd hardly call them finished.
The underlying reason behind this attitude, of course, is the Bengals. Once the NFL season is half over, it's usually pretty obvious that the Bengals will not go to the playoffs. As a matter of fact, one of the safest bets (sometimes paying only 2-1) in Las Vegas has been that the Bengals will not be a .500 team. So the fans naturally take a fatalist attitude towards their football team of choice. The problem is when they extend this attitude towards the Reds. It's hardly fair to the players on the Reds franchise, it's not particularly fair to Bob Boone, the manager (who holds the second-worst winning percentage among active managers, it should be noted - the guy's an idiot), and it's not really fair to the GM. Yes, the owner is a tightwad. You can't hope to spend 60 million dollars on an entire major league roster and still expect to win games. But Bowden has managed to assemble at least a better team than he had any right to build...
Sometimes I get the impression that fans from a certain city really do blow. Philadelphia fans, for example, have been known to throw batteries at Santa Claus. But this is a little more insidious...the fans, instead of saying, "the team sucks," are saying instead, "the team cannot hope to pull itself back together," when in reality the team is not broken. It's not right, it's not fair, it's not a well-informed decision, and it makes me glad I'm a Giants fan. Hoo-rah.
posted by Brian at 5:23 PM
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