By Conrad Clowers
Cincinnati Herald Contributor
Usually another word for rookie is mistake. They’ve been known to be your biggest headaches one minute and give you the biggest joy the next. Be that as it may, the Cincinnati Reds are in the middle of the playoff hunt ‘because’ of the youth rookie movement. They are not in it ‘in spite of’ the movement.
Manager David Bell and his bosses can be criticized for many things. One thing they cannot be criticized for is taking a chance. The Cincinnati Reds lost 100 games last season. This season they could be in the post season. Elly De La Cruz, Spencer Steer, Matt Mclain, Christian Encarnacion-Strand, and Andrew Abbott are all rookies that start or frequently start. Had the Reds continued with the roster that started off the 2023 season, the team would likely be in or close to last place. One by one the Super Rookies came up to the 25-man roster and have had a major impact. Spencer Steer is hitting .267 with 18 home runs and 66 RBI’s. Steers name was mentioned early on as a possible MVP candidate.Â
Speer is only one of the Reds Super rookies making an impact. Christian Encarnacion-Strand is one of the latest of the Super Rookies to come up. Nearly immediately, Strand has shown his natural ability and what the rest of the National League will have to deal with in years to come. This past weekend, Strand hit a towering home run against the Toronto Blue Jays. It would be the only run of the game and gave Cincy a 1-0 victory.
Most teams that showcase this many rookies have growing pains and losses stacked up from mistakes. There have been plenty of mistakes and growing pains displayed by some of the Reds new first year players. As dynamic as Elly De La Cruz is, he has had base running errors that have cost Reds critical outs along with undisciplined strikeouts. Andrew Abbott who had a record setting start to his MLB debut, is now coming to find out things aren’t as easy in the MLB after players have started to face you multiple times.
Currently Cincinnati is 64-61 in the National League Central Division. They are 4 games out of the division lead and 1 game out of the Wild Card Standings. The team has nearly 40 games to go to make a case to be in the post season. If they are to make the post season, rookie talent is what will steer the team to the post season.Â
Veteran Joey Votto is in the final season of his contract. Votto has expressed many times over his Hall of Fame worthy career that the only thing missing from his life as a Red is a championship ring. Back in 2010 Votto was part of a youth movement that would see the Reds in the playoffs multiple seasons. The talent in 2023 is even better than 2010. Hopefully, the results will be better than a 3-game first round sweep the Reds suffered in the 2010 playoffs.