I’m on dial-up this week, so only after I’d composed today’s entry did I learn of the Padres-Red Sox trade. If you missed it, the Pads sent Jay Payton, Ramon Vazquez, David Pauley, and $2.65M to Boston for Dave Roberts and undisclosed amounts of petroleum jelly. Analysis will follow in the coming days, as soon as I can come up with something more insightful than “ugh.”

Put me behind the wheel of an automobile for 12-14 hours, no problem. Stick me on a plane for less than half that time and I’m a complete basket case. And we haven’t even gotten to the Drunk Chick (TM) across the aisle from me. I’m not saying that her headphones were too loud, but there ought to be a law against inflicting “Sussudio” on humans three times in one day.

Fortunately an excellent Indonesian buffet on Kapi’olani and time with family have put me in a better frame of mind.

I’ll be posting a picture each day while I’m in Hawai’i. Today’s is the view from our hotel in downtown Honolulu. We’re about three blocks from everything here, which is good because we didn’t rent a car. Skip past the photo to get to our scouting report.

And now we turn to page 309 of The Scouting Report: 1990 to learn more about ESPN analyst and former Mariner second baseman Harold Reynolds:

His best weapon is his speed on ground balls, giving him the ability to leg out a lot of infield hits. His slashing, chopping swing is not picture perfect, but it’s effective as he makes solid contact… Some feel that Reynolds should be more selective and improve his on-base percentage via the walk… Reynolds bunts well and likes to drag the ball, but could probably do so even more than he does now… Harold is a team player and does all the little things that are important… Reynolds has the speed to be among the top base stealers in the AL… He’s not reading the pitchers well and has been caught stealing 47 times in the last two season… No one plays second base better than Reynolds… His range is exceptional and his instincts outstanding… Reynolds is also fearless at turning the double play.

Reynolds led the AL in percentage of swings put into play (59.9%) in 1989. He had the second worst stolen base percentage (58.1%).

After hitting .300/.359/.369 in 1989, Reynolds finished at .252/.336/.347 the following season. The good news was he drew a career-high 81 walks in 1990. The bad news was his batting average dropped by 48 points, dragging his on base percentage with it.

Reynolds led the AL in stolen bases in 1987 (60), in triples in 1989 (11), and in at-bats in 1990 (642). For his career, he hit .258/.327/.341 in over 1300 games. Reynolds had more walks (480) than strikeouts (417) as a big leaguer.

As for his defense, I’m not the biggest believer in range factors, but in this case they bear out the visual evidence. Here is how he compared against the league in each of his seasons as a full-time starter:

Yr    RF  LgRF
86  5.50  4.34
87  5.34  4.48
88  4.90  4.40
89  5.41  4.51
90  5.18  4.53
91  5.10  4.44
92  4.96  4.60
93  4.98  4.54
tot 4.99  4.48

Reynolds’ best comp is Mickey Morandini. The rest of his top 10 comps all spent the bulk of their career in the 1970s or earlier.

Hope you enjoyed that little look back at the career of Harold Reynolds. We’ll focus on Padre broadcaster Mark Grant in our next installment, tentatively scheduled for this Friday.