And this one belongs to the Bengals!
The Castellinis are now Cincinnati’s No. 1 sports villains, and the Brown family are the cool kids. Here’s how the Reds can duplicate the Bengals’ return to favor.
This year marks my tenth season covering the Reds for Cincinnati Magazine. The Reds haven’t been particularly successful for most of those years, but they’ve usually been interesting, and I’ve enjoyed chronicling the club in my weekly column (see this week’s column below). Plus, my editor isn’t concerned about keeping the Reds happy, and lets me tell it like I see it. It’s rare to have such freedom, and I’m appreciative.
Occasionally, I write pieces for the print edition of the magazine as well, whenever they need witticisms about the national pastime. In three of the past four years, I’ve also written a feature column that runs in the April issue, just as baseball returns in the Queen City.
We batted a few ideas around for this year’s feature, but landed on a compare/contrast between the Reds and Bengals. Specifically, Reds ownership has been a punching bag for the last couple of years,* but Bengals ownership — Mike Brown — was the villain in Cincinnati for many years. So my premise was this: if the Browns can turn it around, why can’t the Reds?
*Guilty as charged.
I didn’t want this to be another hit piece on the Castellinis. Seriously. I wanted to lay out the case, with specific suggestions for how the Reds can turn it around by mimicking a few things the Bengals did to engineer their resurgence. I tried to make the case that it was possible for the Reds to fix things, and that they can do it sooner rather than later.
Of course, some people saw the brilliant illustration from Mike Tofanelli that accompanied the piece and assumed I was piling on the Castellini family again. That really wasn’t my intention!
Anyway, it’s in stores now, or you should have already received a copy if you are a subscriber. Go out and buy one, and then send a fax* over to Cincinnati Magazine telling them that you only bought it because you’re loyal to me.
*Do people still send faxes?
Or you can read it online by clicking this handy link! Either way, check it out and let me know what you think.
At Cincinnati Magazine: The Reds Got Horny on Opening Weekend
Note: I don’t write the headlines! I’m not sure who’s responsible for this one.
Cincinnati has celebrated 147 baseball Opening Days, and almost all of them were special in one way or another. This year was no exception. Despite a loss to Pittsburgh in the inaugural game of the 2023 season, Cincinnati clawed back to win the series behind several strong performances—and there was a particular moment that gave me hope that this year’s team will be, if not good, at least interesting.
Just when you think you’ve seen everything on the diamond, baseball finds a way to surprise you. That moment occurred in the bottom of the fourth on Opening Day, with the Reds trailing 4-1. With one out, Cincinnati rookie third baseman Spencer Steer, who had walked in his first at-bat, blasted a 2-2 pitch deep over the left-center field wall for the season’s first Reds home run.
The solo shot narrowed Pittsburgh’s lead to two runs, and it was encouraging to see Steer start out his season so well. After all, he’s a talented young player who has an opportunity to grab the job on Cincinnati’s hot corner and keep it for the foreseeable future. But in the context of a 162-game season, well, it was a homer and that’s always fun, but the Reds still had plenty of work to do to win the game.
Steer rounded the bases, stepped on home plate, and received high-fives from teammates Will Benson and Jose Barrero. As soon as he entered the dugout, however, he removed his batting helmet just in time for second baseman Jonathan India to place a viking helmet on Steer’s head. Then TJ Friedl draped a robe around Steer’s shoulders as he made his way through the dugout, receiving congratulations from his teammates. Read the rest at Cincinnati Magazine.
What Chad’s Watching
Only saw one movie in theaters last week, the latest installment in the John Wick franchise. You’ll notice above that I didn’t rate it yet. Frankly, I need to see it again. I thought the first hour was not particularly good, but then we got some serious Wicky goodness over the last two hours.
“Man Hunt” was directed by Fritz Lang (“Metropolis,” “M”); it’s a story about a British big-game hunter who is captured with Hitler in his gun sight. After escaping custody, he becomes the hunted. A crisp 102 minutes, it’s a great watch if you subscribe to the Criterion Channel.
I watched Sly Stallone’s “Cobra” for the first time, partly because I’m not sure how I never saw it in the 80s and partly because I wanted to listen to the Rewatchables episode about the movie. It may be the most unintentionally hilarious movie I’ve ever seen.
As for “Animal House,” well it’s on Netflix now. It hasn’t aged particularly well, but there are some brilliantly funny sequences, as you probably know.
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