It made for perfect and telling symmetry: Astros add Hall of Fame pitcher to starting rotation of studs. Reds, bless 'em, sign 37-year-old pinch hitter.

Pittsburgh is one of many stops in John Vander Wal's career. (Steven M. Herppich/file photo)

Nothing against Vander Wal. He's a fine hitter. But he's hardly the player the Reds need to be taken seriously. Vander Wal is the final piece for a team working on a title puzzle. Maybe Houston should have signed him, too.

At this point, there is no use in slamming Cincinnati's ownership. It is what it is. There's no reason to hammer Dan O'Brien, the rookie general manager. He's doing what he can with what he hasn't been given. O'Brien is a baseball man, not an alchemist.

Here is what to note about Monday. Here's what to keep in mind when you write your check to the Reds this summer or plunk down your cash at the window:

It's entertainment now.

Come to Pretty Good American Ball Park. Watch baseball as you might a movie. Cultivate your "Take Me Out to the Ball Game" sensibility: Have some Cracker Jack. Don't give it your heart, because chances are good the Reds will stomp that sucker flat. Baseball is just a night out.

We've never said that before. Baseball is a serious passion here. You take it personally.

You'd better stop.

The Reds are asking you, without asking you, to bear with them while they put up the orange barrels. Pardon their mess. In three or five years, the road will be finished, or so they say. Meantime, enjoy the view of the river.

Rebuilding is an obsolete term in other sports. NFL teams don't rebuild. College basketball powers don't rebuild. They get a kid for one year or two, lose him and reload. One or two players can turn around an NBA team. Baseball offers no such cure.

The Reds are faced with a long, slow slog back to contending. How's that for a marketing plan? Come Slog With Us.

The Reds want you to buy hope. That's hard to do now, because hope requires patience and belief. Sports fans aren't patient people, especially when they're paying the mortgage on a new ballpark that was supposed to fund the home team into contention. PGABP was going to help generate the money needed to compete with teams like Houston. It hasn't done that.

Hood met Wink at 100 Main St. The joke's on us.

The Reds have relied on their division's mediocrity to keep hope alive. They took comfort in knowing they weren't going wallet to wallet with Atlanta, L.A. and the Mets. After Monday, they can forget that. The NL Central is now two divisions: St. Louis, Houston and the Cubs are on the express elevator; the Reds, Pittsburgh and Milwaukee are taking the stairs.

If ownership doesn't want to pay for the smoother, faster ride, OK. It's their money. Just understand that baseball in Cincinnati is now a whole lot like baseball in, say, Los Angeles: no more consequential than bowling night.

Sometimes you get what you pay for. Sometimes you get John Vander Wal.

---

E-mail pdaugherty@enquirer.com

Return to Reds front page...