Thursday, April 15, 1999
REDS NOTEBOOK
Hill gets over hump vs. Harnisch
BY CHRIS HAFT
The Cincinnati Enquirer
CHICAGO — Glenallen Hill had mustered only two hits in 14 at-bats while striking out seven times against Pete Harnisch going into Wednesday's game.
Harnisch confronted the same Hill, but Hill didn't face the usual Harnisch.
Complaining that he lacked a decent breaking ball, Harnisch allowed two homers to Hill, who drove in three runs and led the Chicago Cubs past the Reds 5-4 at Wrigley Field.
“I usually throw him a lot of sliders. But today I couldn't. I really didn't feel the slider was a good move,” said Harnisch (1-1). “I tried to go with a fastball, and it just wasn't good enough ...
“He's a fastball hitter, a strong guy. If you throw him a lot of fastballs and they're not perfect, he's going to hit one of them hard. I really didn't have the breaking ball to keep him honest.”
Harnisch's 5ô-inning effort ended the five-game streak in which Reds starters had pitched into the seventh inning. He allowed six hits and all of Chicago's runs (four earned) while walking two and striking out two.
Harnisch had a difficult act to follow — the six-hit shutout he pitched Friday at St. Louis.
“Mechanically, last game I felt I was pretty perfect,” he said. “I might have been rushing a little bit today. But it takes a while to get in a groove. It doesn't happen right at the beginning.”
headRearranged rotation
The Reds plan to change the sequence of their pitchers after Monday's scheduled off day, separating their pair of left-handers, Steve Avery and Denny Neagle, in the starting rotation.
Currently, Jason Bere precedes Avery. They'll pitch in that order Friday and Saturday, respectively, during the Reds' three-game series against the Pittsburgh Pirates. Neagle is expected to make his regular-season Reds debut Sunday.
Then, after Harnisch and Brett Tomko work the first two games of the following series Tuesday and Wednesday against the New York Mets, Avery will step in front of Bere to pitch Thursday. Avery will still get his usual four days' rest. Pitching on six days' rest, Bere will open the Houston series Friday, April 23, followed by Neagle.
headTheir kind of town
On Tuesday's off day, Bere, Danny Graves, Mark Lewis, Chris Stynes, Pokey Reese, Tomko and Dmitri Young attended a taping of The Jerry Springer Show. They were guests of Springer, the former Cincinnati mayor and WLWT-TV news anchor who visited one of the Reds' spring training workouts and attended an exhibition game.
“I couldn't turn down the opportunity,” Reese said.
Nobody could quite pinpoint the show's subject matter, though it seemed to deal with unfaithful lovers, both heterosexual and homosexual. “One of the usual topics,” Young said.
headEtc.
Thanks to Aaron Boone, the Reds still have homered at least once in every game.
• The starting time for next Wednesday night's game against the New York Mets at Cinergy Field has been changed from 7:05p.m. to 7:35 to accommodate ESPN. The cable TV network plans to use the game as a backup telecast.
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