CHICAGO – Stealing bases has become a dying art in the Major Leagues as teams believe it’s not worth risking an out on the base paths.
The problem for the Cincinnati Reds is they aren’t stealing often, and they aren’t successful when they do try to swipe an extra bag. They’ve stolen 10 bases in 21 attempts this year, a 48% success rate, which ranks last in the Majors by a wide margin.
There have been nine teams that have been caught stealing at least 10 times this season. The Reds are the only team with fewer than 20 stolen bases in that group. Compare that to the San Diego Padres, who lead the Majors with 58 stolen bases and they’ve been caught a league-leading 15 times.
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“As far as stealing bases go, for sure, you want to be opportunistic,” Reds manager David Bell said. “You want to have a high percentage or it’s really not worth it. There are times when we get thrown out that the upside of stealing a base may be greater than the downside of getting thrown out, but we have been thrown out more than I would like, for sure.
“I think we just have to be smarter about it. We have strengths on this team. I would say overall team speed is not a super strength of ours, so I just think we have to be smarter about it.”
Nick Senzel was the Reds’ biggest speed threat and he was caught five times this season. Senzel is now sidelined for at least the next month after undergoing arthroscopic knee surgery earlier this week.
Tyler Naquin leads the Reds with three stolen bases while Senzel and Jonathan India have two apiece.
The Reds, according to Baseball-Reference, have been picked off three times and recorded 12 outs on the base paths that weren’t classified as caught stealing, pickoffs or force plays. Jesse Winker was tossed out at second base to end an inning Thursday when he tried to stretch a single into a double.
“As far as taking extra bases, that’s always been such a fine line for me,” Bell said. “Nothing is ever said when you take the extra base and you end up scoring, or you go first to third, but as soon as you get thrown out, there’s a lot of attention put on that. And rightfully so, that’s just the way it is, but the game takes such aggressiveness and fearlessness to play.
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“It’s a fine balance between continuing to encourage that in all areas but understanding situations. Being smart is certainly a part of it. I think for us it’s even more challenging, we have to be even smarter, because we don’t have a ton of guys that their game is built on speed.”
WAKE-UP CALL: The Reds had this week circled as one of their tougher parts of their schedule because of the travel. They were scheduled to play a night game in Washington D.C. on Thursday and a day game in Chicago on Friday.
It turned into a split doubleheader Thursday, though the seven-inning nightcap was helpful for a shorter game and a lighter burden on the team’s bullpen. The Reds arrived at their team hotel a little after 1 a.m. Friday.
“There’s nothing we can do about travel,” Bell said. “We’re just not going to think about it. Obviously, we’ve taken precautions and we’ll do everything we can to take care of our players, but we’ve all done it before.”
One of those precautions is scheduling off days for some of the lineup regulars. Nick Castellanos sat in Thursday’s nightcap. Eugenio Suárez was out of the lineup Friday.
“Trying to be somewhat strategic about not taking multiple regulars out of the lineup, but at the same time, we have guys ready to step in,” Bell said. “This is a particularly different type of challenge with the travel.”
Suárez, moved to the leadoff spot in the lineup, had a solid series against the Nationals. He reached base in five of his 13 plate appearances, and he homered off Max Scherzer and Stephen Strasburg.
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Was it more difficult to keep Suárez out of the lineup Friday?
“Not really just because sometimes it’s harder to give off days to guys when they’re struggling,” Bell said. “They want so bad to breakthrough. When you know you have an off day coming up and have a good game going into that, a lot of times those days of rest are a little bit more restful."
DELAYED BY A DAY: Wade Miley, sidelined with a left foot injury, is eligible to be activated Sunday from the 10-day injured list, but the Reds will have him wait to pitch until their series opener against the Philadelphia Phillies on Monday.
Tyler Mahle will start Sunday’s game against the Chicago Cubs on regular rest.
“Wade has had a little bit of a cold or sinus allergy kind of thing going on,” Bell said. “He’s probably going to be fine Sunday, but just with him coming back after the foot injury too, we had the ability to do that, so we just wanted to be safe. Give him one more day to be at full strength.”
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ROSTER MOVES: To make room for Vladimir Gutierrez’s first Major League start, the Reds optioned right-hander Ashton Goudeau to Triple-A Louisville.
Goudeau, 28, pitched four scoreless innings, allowing one hit and one walk while striking out two.
Right-hander Art Warren, who served as the 27th man for the split doubleheader Thursday, will remain with the club on the taxi squad.
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