Friday, August 23, 2002
It's make-or-break time for Reds
By John Fay, jfay@enquirer.com
The Cincinnati Enquirer
PHOENIX — As the days pass on the baseball calendar, every team reaches the win-or-else point. The Reds are there.
They had dropped seven of their last nine games going into Thursday night's series finale with the Arizona Diamondbacks. That put them a season-high 7
games behind the first-place St.Louis Cardinals in the National League Central.
“You get to a point every season where if you don't win, it looks like it's over,” Reds captain Barry Larkin said. “That's where we are.”
The Reds open a three-game series today against the second-place Astros in Houston. After a day off Monday, they open a four-game series against St.Louis on Tuesday.
Winning anything less than five or six of seven in that stretch probably will end the Reds' postseason chances.
“I said this stretch would define us,” Reds manager Bob Boone said. “I was hoping it would define us the way I'd like it to.”
The stretch Boone mentioned began Aug. 13 with three games with the world champion Diamondbacks. That started a schedule of 23 games in 23 days, 20 of which were against the D'backs, Astros and Cards.
The beginning of the stretch meant facing Randy Johnson (twice), Curt Schilling, Wade Miller and Roy Oswalt, who are a combined 65-17, in seven days.
“We saw what it takes to beat them,” Boone said. “You better have talent, and you better execute perfectly. We haven't executed perfectly.”
That was never clearer when twice in two days, the Reds couldn't get a run home from third base with no outs.
“We don't have enough guys who can hit a sacrifice fly in that situation,” Boone said. “To win world championships, you have to be able to do that.”
Said Larkin: “We are where we are. We can't change that. We've got to win now.”
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It's make-or-break time for Reds
