BATTER UP: CINCINNATI REDS

Counting down the seconds till Opening Day when life begins anew involves providing a "starting nine" of for all 29 major-league teams, and if there's time, the Devil Rays. Presenting: The Cincinnati Reds.

1. Adam Dunn (top photo) is 6 feet, 6 inches of sociological frailties: Remember being eight or nine years old and there would be some toy you wanted? That was what playing quarterback for the Texas Longhorns once meant to the Reds outfielder, but the UT coaches liked Chris Simms and wanted Dunn to play another position. Long story short, hearing older men talk to him about why he'd be a good "tight end" led to Dunn pursing baseball.
   
   Dunn is a productive player. He hits 40 homers a year, which is impressive considering he never gets to face gopher ball-prone teammate Eric Milton. Still, you have to wonder: Dunn has regularly set strikeout records and occasionally plays the outfield like he's a newcomer to North America who's attending his first baseball game. Did losing the Texas QB job to Chris Simms, whose name is a punchline to most football fans, permanently bend Dunn's brain?
2. Wouldn't it be adequate: The Reds were 80-82 last season and basically return with the same lineup, with the exception of a new shortstop and 40-year-old Jeff Conine as a part-time first baseman. Now here's the scary part: They overachieved to go 80-82 (based on their run differential, they were about a 76-win team).
3. One thing to keep you up late: If the Reds were baseball's first professional team, then who did they play?
4. What recent news story involving a '70s and '80s icon was less shocking? That the physique 60-year-old Sylvester Stallone displayed for Rocky Balboa might have been chemically enhanced, or that Pete Rose now saying he only bet on the Reds ?
   
   As if admitting he always bet on his own team gets Rose off the hook one iota. It's baseball, you're going to a lose one-third of the time. So Pete Rose is not only a bastard, he's a dumb bastard. By the way, look at who else says he was betting on Reds games. (It's a parody.)
5. Retro Cool Red: Only one member of Cincy's Big Red Machine of the 1970s was referenced in the movie Airplane! -- Pedro Borbón (relief pitcher, 1969-79). He's also perhaps the only player to ever take a bite out of another player's cap. In the 1973 playoffs between the Reds and Mets, a fight broke out on the field after a Cincinnati player -- you'd never guess who in a million years, but his name rhymes with ete Rose -- slid hard into second base. When the fight dissipated, Borbón scooped a hat off the grass, only to find it was that of Mets pitcher Buzz Capra, so he did what came naturally -- he took a bite out of it. Who knows -- maybe he didn't like Frank Capra's films.
6. Maybe he should change his name to Max Power: The top Reds prospect is a pitcher named Homer Bailey. You know what this means: The Bengals will be looking to draft an offensive lineman named Holden.
7. Don't cry for Ken Griffey Jr.: Anyone who prefers Cincinnati to Seattle has it coming, especially when the former is your hometown.
   
   Aside from Eric Lindros, it's hard to think of any 1990s sports star whose career fell down the side of a ravine right after the dawn of the new century. Griffey's missed 418 games since coming to the Reds -- how many home runs has that cost him? -- and Cincy hasn't come close to a playoff spot, save for last year when it finished 3 1/2 games out with a sub-.500 record. Griffey's probably hit the point where he finally has to give up the ghost and move to a corner spot. Even more telling: His Baseball-Reference.com page is sponsorless, which is odd for a player who was once considered the best in the game and who will be in Cooperstown one day.
8. Votto, as in Swotto (and skating like he's Blotto): Reds prospect Joey Votto, a Toronto native, recently admitted to Reds.com that he wasn't much for hockey: "I took a girl skating once. I fell all over the place and she laughed at me."
   
   Don't worry, Joey: The Leafs' Hal Gill had some similar experiences during his awkward phase -- possibly as recently as two weeks ago.
   
   Seriously, though, Cincinnati fans are hoping Votto becomes the NL's answer to Justin Morneau -- a lefty-hitting Canadian first baseman who craps RBIs. Like Morneau, he won a MVP award in 2006, taking the honours after hitting .319/.403/.547 in the Double-A Southern League. He's expected to play with Triple-A Lousville, who visit the Lynx here in Ottawa from May 1-4.
9. Need-to-know: Aaron Harang and Bronson Arroyo make a sweet duo in the starting rotation and if you play in a keeper fantasy league and haven't nabbed Todd Coffey with an eye to making him your closer, it's probably too late. Other than that, the Reds figure to be fourth in the NL Central again, but '08 and '09 should be more exciting when the likes of Bailey and Votto are ready for prime time.

That's all for now. Send your thoughts to neatesager@yahoo.ca.