By John Erardi
The Cincinnati Enquirer

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Photos of Saturday's game

The Reds are taking a hard look at how they scout, coach and train their young pitchers.

In the past four to five years, the Reds have spent more than $10 million in signing high school and college arms. But for the most part, they haven't gotten them to the big leagues.

And that $10 million estimate is probably a couple million dollars low. It might be closer to $12 million, but the Reds won't discuss numbers, and the Enquirer chose to err on the conservative side when reaching a total.

Trying to develop pitching is a huge financial drain on every major-league organization. Each drafts a slew of pitchers, but how many good homegrown starters are on their major-league staffs?

Not many. But most teams have at least one starter coming through their system who is either good or getting good.

A question the Reds, who picked up pitchers from Oakland, the New York Yankees and Boston in last month's trades, are asking: "Why are other teams' guys more advanced than most of our own?"

Until the Reds called up Jose Acevedo on July 19, they had no homegrown starters on this season's roster.

Acevedo, a 25-year-old from the Dominican Republic, is a poster boy for Cincinnati's squandered opportunity. The Reds signed him in 1996 and he has become a bright light in their rotation, but the team went many years under previous owner Marge Schott without scouting in Latin America.

"Acevedo is somebody that can be penciled into the starting rotation (next year)," said Tim Naehring, the Reds' director of player development. "It's been awhile since we've been able to do that."

Acevedo went 2-0 with a 2.67 ERA in five games - four of them starts - this season before going on the 15-day disabled list Aug. 8 because of a sprained ankle.

Under now-departed general manager Jim Bowden, the Reds used a lot of call-ups on retreads like Jimmy Anderson, Joey Hamilton and Todd Van Poppel instead of bringing up a young pitcher like Acevedo.

"The attitude (in Cincinnati) was, 'We need to do it now,' " said Doc Rodgers, a former Bowden assistant who is now director of minor-league operations for the Baltimore Orioles. "It's tough in that situation to call up the younger guy."

Scouting, developing

Of the 150 starting pitching spots in the major leagues on Opening Day - that's 30 teams with five starters each - only one was occupied by a Reds signee: Brett Tomko of the St. Louis Cardinals.

"That's pretty bad," said Alan Schwarz, senior writer for Baseball America, which closely tracks each organization's minor-league system. "I don't know of anybody who's produced fewer (major-league starters)."

Things have improved since Opening Day. The Reds have Acevedo, and former Red Kevin Jarvis moved into the starting rotation for San Diego.

"I take my hat off to (former Triple-A Louisville manager and interim Reds manager) Dave Miley and (Louisville pitching coach) Mack Jenkins," said former Reds pitcher and current broadcaster Joe Nuxhall. "Jose was sent down because he wasn't making quality pitches - everything was right down Broadway. He came back here and he was making quality pitches." The Reds are working to duplicate that success.

"We're addressing every single facet of our pitching development program - scouting, signing, developing, the medical program, everything, top to bottom," said Brad Kullman, who along with Leland Maddox is directing the Reds' baseball operations.

"To say we haven't signed any good pitchers isn't really fair. To say we haven't developed them to the big leagues, yes, that's a fact. We're looking at everything."

Are the scouts not signing the right pitchers? Or are the developers not advancing the progress of these young arms?

Ryan Wagner, who came almost straight to Cincinnati out of the University of Houston after being chosen in June's draft as a college pitcher, is one of the Reds' few successes. He's 2-0 with a 2.77 ERA in 11 games with the Reds this season.

And even the use of Wagner reflects the approach of the new-age Reds - he is on a rigidly observed schedule of appearances. Pitch counts, inning counts and between-appearance workouts are being carefully planned and monitored for every pitcher in the system.

And Wagner's throwing motion, which puts high torque on the arm, isn't being altered. In the past it might have been tweaked, but he was so successful in college that the Reds are letting it go.

"You look at an organization like Arizona, which is doing a fine job with its young pitching, and their philosophy is, 'Send the young pitchers out there, don't make a lot of changes (in their motions) ... but take care of them, protect them,' " said Johnny Almaraz, a Reds scout, special assistant to the GMs and senior adviser on player development.

But it was not until June's draft that such a "do not touch" edict was issued for newly drafted pitchers. Before that, the young pitchers' approach to pitching was refined in an effort to protect their arms.

Soft spots

The Reds won't divulge where they think their weak spots in developing pitching might be.

So, the Enquirer spoke with some past and present Reds personnel with major-league pitching backgrounds: Nuxhall, television broadcaster Chris Welsh and former Triple-A and big-league pitching coach Grant Jackson.

They all think the Reds could use some help in determining who are the best pitching prospects and should not overemphasize weight work.

They also wonder about too much turnover in the team's scouting and development people, and the fact that only three of the Reds' scouts were pitchers.

Almaraz says the Reds have sufficient cross-checking that allows more than one scout to see the their top draft picks. But one has to wonder if the Reds are missing some future big-league starting pitchers in the middle rounds - La Salle High's Zach Day (Montreal Expos) and the University of Kentucky's Brandon Webb (Arizona), among others.

"I'm not saying there aren't some good pitching evaluators who aren't pitchers. A good scout's a good scout," Welsh said. "I'm just saying when you have a non-pitcher evaluate pitching, he tends to go to those measurements he can quantify (such as radar-gun readings).

"You've got guys who have never picked up a baseball and stood 60 feet, 6 inches from the hitter, but they're making decisions about pitching."

Kullman counters that he looked back at the Reds' scouting report on UK's Webb, and their scout - a former pitcher no longer employed by Cincinnati - wrote: "He'll never be anything more than a middle reliever."

Dead-on

The Reds swear they were dead-on in their picks of high school pitchers Ty Howington, Chris Gruler and Justin Gillman - the reports of various scouting services back them up on that - but each has had his development slowed by arm injuries.

The Reds were convinced Howington was going to be a key component of their starting staff on Opening Day 2003, but that was before he had elbow surgery.

Naehring, who played eight years in the big leagues, was named to his player development position only three years ago.

When he first came in, there was a glut of older pitchers at high Single-A, Double-A and Triple-A. He since has been supplied with a lot of young pitchers via the draft, but many of them were high school pitchers.

"A lot of things can happen between high school and the major leagues," Rodgers notes.

Some of those things are injuries. The Reds have had 68 arm surgeries on their pitchers since 2000, according to published figures.

"We've been turning over rocks to find a better way," Naehring said. "We've got a quite a few arms that aren't ready yet."

Which is where Brandon Claussen, Aaron Harang, Joe Valentine, Jeff Bruksch and Phillip Dumatrait- the pitchers acquired in last month's trades - come in.

The Reds have had some success in developing pitchers with their own picks, such as Acevedo, John Riedling and Josh Hall, and other organizations', such as Chris Reitsma and Brian Reith. But there aren't enough of them, and there's no sign of a No. 1 or No. 2 starter on the verge of knocking down the door.

Charles Atlas

"When you turn over the keys to your minor-league pitching future to a conditioning expert who doesn't know anything about pitching, you're emphasizing the wrong things," Welsh said.

"Pitchers are being measured on the basis of body fat, not whether they can locate their fastball. They're being measured on their stamina and not on whether they can throw a 3-1 changeup. ... When you get non-baseball people - Jim Bowden - they want to quantify."

Welsh says that if you look at major-league pitchers, with the exception of Kyle Farnsworth, "Nobody else looks like Charles Atlas. And (Farnsworth) has had his share of injuries."

And, asks Welsh, where are the slow curveballs? Where are the get-ahead breaking balls?

"I don't see anybody teaching it," Welsh said. "I keep hearing about 'this guy that throws hard and has a great slider.' Which is fine. But why force a guy into that category if he doesn't fall into it? There's got to be somebody who throws a curveball."

Welsh said Cincinnati is missing the boat by not having around guys like former Reds pitcher Jack Billingham, who knew how to pitch and is a great instructor.

"And a major void was left when they (the Reds) didn't take care of Grant Jackson and he left," Welsh said. "He's one of the best ever."

Welsh said the Reds' best pitching coach is Don Gullett, but "you have to give him much more leeway as to how his philosophy of pitching is taught and coached throughout the minor leagues."

The Reds say they are doing that.

Welsh also noticed there wasn't much pitching in the backgrounds of Bowden's multitude of advisers.

A high-ranked person in the Reds' organization - a person who didn't want to be identified for this story - told Bowden the same thing, which is when Sammy Ellis (seven years in the big leagues, five with Cincinnati) was brought in as Cincinnati's minor-league pitching coordinator.

"With the exception of Johnny Almaraz, the first thing I hear (from the people up here) is how hard a guy throws on the gun," Welsh said. "Who cares?

"I remember seeing Mark Wohlers out here about three years ago, and every pitch he threw was 97, 98 miles an hour. And on every other pitch he was backing up third because of all the rockets off the wall. How do you throw 98 and get hit? There's more to it than the gun."

In June's draft, the Reds did de-emphasize the gun, Almaraz said.

"We got a lot of guys with solid, average arms who can pitch," he said. "We're hoping that after we get them freshened up, that they're going to improve their velocities and be successful."

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