So, What happened to the "Rebuild"????

[Mustang]

Take my comments with a grain of salt, because I am very much a casual fan who will watch the Reds if they are on TV, but by doing so I notice subtle things going on with the team that others might overlook, and often as in the case of this topic not so subtle things.  But I have a memory like an elephant. 

What happened to the Rebuild???  The Rebuild was something perpetrated upon us about five or six years ago, where we sold all of our good players, and were going to develop players in our farm system that would develop into budding superstars, keeping us competitive for the long run, and taking us to the promised land.    Well how has that worked out?

I'd say that we are presently on the "Ellis Island" plan - Give us your tired, your poor, your casts off, and the huddled masses of the mediocre.  How many of these guys are products of our farm system????  We are a swinging door of players, many of whom I've never heard of,  but don't have to remember their names because they will be gone in short order.  I'd like to know how many players have washed through this program over the past few years.

Going back to when I was a kid, Johnny Temple (2b) Roy McMillen (SS), Ted Kluszewski/George Crowe (1b), and Jim Greengrass/Don Hoak (3b) patrolled the infield.  Frank Robinson, Gus Bell and Wally Post played the outfield and Ed Bailey was the catcher for years at a time.  How many kids today can recite the Reds starting lineup from one year to the next???  They can't, because there is no consistency from one day to another yet alone years at a time.   Back then these guys had an allegiance to the city for who they played, and we related to them.  They now sell themselves to the highest bidder, with no allegiance whatever to this city.

Because we are somewhere in the mid-thirties when it comes to the size of our media market, I don't expect things to get much better.