If you watched any of last night or this morning’s highlights, you’re probably already aware Manny Ramirez smacked a pinch-hit grand salami last night, the decisive blow in the Dodgers’ 6-2 defeat of the Reds (on Manny Bobblehead Night, appropriately enough). What you might not know is that Reds broadcaster Chris Welsh, perhaps taking a page out of the Buck Showalter Styleguide, proposed that Dusty Baker intentionally walk Ramirez with the bases loaded. Former Cincinnati Post beat writer C. Trent Rosecrans “had to rewind the DVR just to make sure.”

“We go back to the same old philosophy, how do you pitch to Barry Bonds in his prime? How do you pitch to Albert Pujols now that he™s in his prime? You can say the same thing about Manny Ramirez ” do you allow him to beat you? Bases loaded or not, do you allow him to beat you? Does a walk beat you? You miss off the plate four times in a row and let Juan Pierre come up next and see what happens? It could be that one-run beats the Reds, you never know. But a grand slam takes you a long way to that end¦”

With bases loaded and a 2-2 score in the bottom of the 6th? I don™t walk Jesus there. I may not throw him a fastball over the heart of the plate, but the way the Reds are hitting, I don™t walk him. I think that™s a little much. I understand some times when you can walk a guy with bases loaded, but that is a very limited situation. In a tie game with one out, I don™t think so.

It™s funny, in the bottom of the seventh, I think someone took Chris out of the booth, he didn™t say a single word in the half-inning. Maybe he went to get drug tested.