The Cincinnati Reds made the decision on Tuesday to scratch scheduled starter Nick Lodolo due to an illness, and instead opted to lean on a bullpen game from the get-go against the Toronto Blue Jays.
That’s the same Toronto Blue Jays club who entered play today with a collective .333 wOBA that ranked behind only the New York Yankees (.338) in all of Major League Baseball. Safe to say, that number’s going to be higher come Wednesday when the stats are updated.
The Blue Jays jumped all over opener Scott
Barlow for 4 runs in the Top of the 1st, and backed it with 4 more against lefty Brent Suter in the Top of the 2nd. And while Cincinnati’s offense ultimately rallied hard against Toronto starter Jose Berrios to inch to 8-6 off Austin Hays’ mammoth 3-run dinger in the Bottom of the 2nd, catching up with the Jays on the day was simply not in the cards.
The Reds fell, 12-9, and did so while maxing out their bullpen the entire time.
If there’s a caveat here, it’s that Toronto was forced to throw 191 total pitches to Cincinnati’s 155, meaning their own bullpen is just as taxed heading in to Wednesday’s rubber match. Berrios (6 ER on 66 pitches) lasted just 2.0 IP, meaning the Reds may well be lined up for a chance to win the series against the AL East leaders with a solid performance on Wednesday afternoon, which they’ll do behind starter Zack Littell.
Of course, to do so they’ll have to get through former Cy Young winner Shane Bieber, who came to the Jays via Cleveland at the deadline this year after recovering from 2024 Tommy John surgery. But if anyone knows Bieber, it’s manager Terry Francona, who was his skipper in Cleveland for many years prior to 2024.
If there were plusses to this game, they came in the form of a) Cincinnati’s resilience after finding out Lodolo was out and after watching their bullpen get shelled and b) their offense smacking out 15 hits. Each of TJ Friedl, Noevli Marte, Austin Hays, Ke’Bryan Hayes, Jose Trevino, and Matt McLain had multihit outings, while both Hays and Friedl swatted homers. Sal Stewart, who started at 1B again in his second big league game, also legged out an infield single, while Elly De La Cruz was on base twice (once via single, once via walk).
A loss is still a loss, however. At the time of writing this, the New York Mets logged another victory on the day to move 5 full games ahead of Cincinnati for the second Wild Card spot in the National League playoff chase, and the San Francisco Giants hold a 5-4 lead over the Colorado Rockies in the 8th inning of their game with a victory moving them into a tie with Cincinnati at 70-69 in the standings.
To paraphrase the late, great Yogi Berra, it’s getting late early for these Reds, with perilously few chances left for them to surge the way we hope they could.
First pitch on Wednesday is set for 6:40 PM ET once again, with an off-day looming Thursday before an absolute make-or-break series against the Mets themselves over the weekend next on the docket.
