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From: bah@cbosgd.UUCP (Bruce Hartsough)
Newsgroups: net.sport.baseball
Subject: Re: Pete Rose
Message-ID: <1222@cbosgd.UUCP>
Date: Thu, 6-Jun-85 11:26:36 EDT
Article-I.D.: cbosgd.1222
Posted: Thu Jun  6 11:26:36 1985
Date-Received: Fri, 7-Jun-85 03:24:20 EDT
Organization: AT&T Bell Laboratories, Columbus, Oh
Lines: 64

I noted that David Cherson says it may be time to move on to other business, 
but one thing as a long time Reds fan I must comment on is this business of 
Pete's hurting the team effort by insisting on sticking around.  Have any of 
who say this seen the NL Western Division standings lately?  See who's in 
second, just a game and a half behind San Diego? This weekend the Reds and the 
Padres have a four game series that could put them into first (and if the Reds 
get swept please ignore this posting :-).  I recall seeing a lot of preseason 
polls in this newsgroup, but don't remember anyone saying the club would do 
that well.  There's a long time left to go, of course, but it should be noted:

1)  Pete is batting .295 last I checked, over .300 as a leftie.  I catch most
    of the games on the radio, and he has come up with timely hitting and a
    lot of walks to spark rallies.
2)  The club is playing with tremendous enthusiasm.  At least part of that
    must be credited to the player/manager.  This is evidenced by the number 
    of come from behind victories (although I'd prefer more of the boring lead 
    all the way variety, but after the Dick Wagner lean years I'll take any kind
    they can come up with.)
3)  What's this about talented young outfielders who aren't getting developed 
    because of Pete's selfishness?  Leave it to Yankee, Cub, and Met supporters
    to depict the Red's problems :-)  The chief logjam here as been the aging
    Cesar Cedeno, the waning cleanup batter who is hitting about .240 with few 
    or no homers.  Of late the Reds have replaced him with multi-talented Gary 
    Redus in left, which netted immediate results.  Young Eddie Milner is the
    starter in center field and is doing OK.  Much touted Eric Davis whiffed 
    his way back to the Denver farm club (with a capital K, though I suspect
    he'll be back up later this year).  That's about it for this nonproblem.
4)  It bears restating that the fans should be calling the shots, and this
    is the case in Cincinnati.  Believe me, as long as Pete is playing
    tolerably well they'd rather watch the hometown hero going for Cobb's
    record than anything than anything else the game has to offer.  It's
    really a once in a lifetime thing to have a native son playing on the local
    team getting close to a record thought to be unbreakable.  The fact is
    he is playing better than tolerably well at the plate, and what he has
    admittedly lost in speed and defense is made up for in hustle and 
    leadership.  I get down to Cincinnati a lot from my present base in 
    Columbus, and it is the talk of the town (along with the Bengal's signing 
    of Cris Collinsworth, but that's another newsgroup).  

Re: Fosse.  That's baseball. What good ever comes of playing for Cleveland? :-)
Seriously though, what's this about the All-Star game being just an exhibition
game?  The NBA all-star game, the Pro Bowl, these indeed are meaningless
exhibitions.  THE All-star game though, well, maybe it doesn't show up in the
standings, but only a true American Leaguer would deny that it's one of the
two World Championships of baseball :-).  In most seasons it's easily the most
watched game of the year.  From my experience, it is the most strongly cheered
game (the best party in any case - beats any one Series game for an excuse to
celebrate).  It's the peak event of the my summer - fireworks are fine, but 
I'll take the All-Star game over July fourth for lump-in-the-throat Americana.

Well, that's it.  Just thought a true believer should be heard from before
we let this subject drop, especially when none of the articles on surprising
starts even mentioned the Reds.  Or is not surprising considering the poor
start of the Braves, and the NL West's inability to put a team well over the
.500 mark?  In any case, Red's fans are quite happy with the situation so far
this year, and if the club finishes over .500 it's got to be called a good 
season.  'Nuff said.

Bruce Hartsough
AT&T Bell Laboratories
Columbus, Ohio
...cbosgd!cbcephus!bah

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