Larkin excited about the new regime: Possible return?

[redsrbetter]

By Marc Lancaster
Post staff reporter

The driving force behind this weekend's reunion of the 1990 Reds world championship team is nostalgia for the good old days. And they were good.

"In 1990," Barry Larkin mused Thursday, "there was no greater place to be living than Cincinnati."

The Reds had won the World Series, the Bengals were in the NFL playoffs, the University of Cincinnati had a promising second-year head coach named Bob Huggins on the sideline and Xavier University was coming off a Sweet 16 appearance. For a sports fan, asking for anything more would have been downright greedy.

Fifteen years later, the situation obviously has changed. The Reds are the farthest removed from success of any of Cincinnati's major sports entities, but many hope Wednesday's announcement that new leadership soon will be in place at Great American Ball Park is a sign that a turnaround is imminent.

Larkin, keeping a close eye on the sale proceedings from his home in Florida, is one of those people.

"As soon as I heard the news, I was ecstatic about the opportunities that are going to present themselves now for those players, and for the fans," Larkin said. "Obviously, some things have to happen, but this is a great opportunity."

Robert Castellini's impending stewardship of the Reds, while not exactly a clean break from his former business partner Carl Lindner's regime, should at least provide the franchise with a chance to take a different approach to winning. An unmistakable commitment to that goal would be a start.

Larkin recalled Thursday how the Reds' fortunes improved when former owner Marge Schott decided she was fed up with mediocrity.

"Marge Schott continued to say she was tired of being a bridesmaid and she wanted to get to the big one," Larkin said. "She made the commitment to go out and get Lou Piniella and made some trades during the season - we got Billy Doran, got Danny Jackson, Randy Myers. They really made a conscious effort to bring in people to help the club."

The Reds won their first nine games that season and never relinquished first place, going on to a 91-71 record. After dispatching the Pittsburgh Pirates in six games in the NLCS, Cincinnati stunned heavily favored Oakland with a four-game sweep in the World Series.

There has been sporadic success in the ensuing years - 90 wins in 1992, a division title in 1995 and the one-game playoff loss in 1999 that followed 96 regular-season wins. But the Reds are sitting on five consecutive losing seasons and have fallen well behind the Cardinals, Astros and Cubs in their division.

Reds teams in recent years have done some things right - the 2005 club led the league in most offensive categories - but an inability to put it all together has made them a non-factor around baseball and a source of frustration to the fan base. As a Cincinnati native who spent 19 seasons in a Reds uniform, Larkin knows how much it would mean to have a winner in town again.

"The Cincinnati fans definitely want an opportunity to support a team that's going to go out there and put their best foot forward," he said. "People in Cincinnati just want to see an effort - not to compete, but an effort to win. That's how you win the hearts of the people. I think they understand that you're not always going to be successful, but there's the hustle part. And that goes from the players to the front office to ownership."

Like everyone else, Larkin is waiting to see how everything shakes out with the handover of control. Though he spent last season with the Washington Nationals as a special assistant to former Reds general manager Jim Bowden, Larkin's desire to move into some type of management role with the Reds has never been a secret. The chances of that happening are virtually nil as long as John Allen remains the Reds' chief operating officer, as the two have burned a few bridges.

A housecleaning on Second Street could bode well for Larkin's chances of returning to the club in some capacity, a possibility he readily acknowledged Thursday. But he said his main focus is on his friends still in the clubhouse - Adam Dunn, Austin Kearns, Ken Griffey Jr. and Sean Casey among them.

"I'm excited for Adam and Austin and Junior and Case and all those guys still there playing," Larkin said. "I know what it's like to be in the playoffs, I know what it's like to play for a world championship and because I have such a relationship with those guys, I would like nothing more than to be part of that with them.

"I'm extremely excited about the opportunities for those guys, and who knows what kind of opportunity might present itself for me. I'm not really concerned about that right now. I'm talking about the city, the people, the people I see down here (in Florida) who are Cincinnati Reds fans, I'm sure they're excited as well. It would be really nice just to be proactive and take an aggressive stand on doing whatever needs to be done to try to re-establish the greatness and the tradition that was once in Cincinnati."

http://news.cincypost.com/apps/pbcs....40317/1035/SPT

[redsrbetter]

It would be insane if we get him back in Cincinnati. He still has love for this team and I think this is entirely possible if Allen is subtracted. The possibilities are endless and I am excited as well.

[Wally Mo Pena]

this will certainly be one of the best parts of the new ownership coming in, if it happens.

[Geki Ace]

Larkin as the new infield or bench coach would be awesome.