JJ Bleday leaned out and turned on a Zack Littell meatball in the Top of the 6th inning of Saturday night’s game between the Cincinnati Reds and Arizona Diamondbacks down in the Land of the Endless Strip Mall, and the laser flew over the fence in right field at Chase Field for a homer.
That’s cool in a nutshell. What made it even more special, though, is that the Cincinnati outfielder had already picked up a single, double, and triple on the evening, and this homer game him the cycle.
The cycle – just the 8th in the long, storied history of the Cincinnati Reds – was a marked change from where Bleday’s form has been so far in August. Despite scorching the earth with his play in May after being recalled from AAA Louisville, he’s fallen into something of a three true outcomes slugger ever since, with the hits and homers being much fewer and more far between.
Not so on Saturday, though.
Bleday’s homer played pile-on for the Reds, who held an 8-2 lead at the time. Each of JJ, Elly De La Cruz, and Sal Stewart had been electric at the plate so far on the day, and that’s pretty much the lone recipe for the Reds having success on any given night.
Fortunately, that was the case tonight – including Elly smashing a towering 450 homer to right off his former teammate Littell.
