The Midwest League and Minor League Baseball have named infielder Carter Graham as the league’s Player of the Month for June.

When the 2026 season began Carter Graham wasn’t on the minds of many who follow the Cincinnati Reds farm system. In each of the previous two years he had split time between Single-A Daytona and High-A Dayton without finding much success. April was more of the same as Graham had a .692 OPS with just two extra-base hits in 16 games with Dayton in April.

But everything changed in May as he went out and hit .333/.460/.586 in 27 games for Dayton and drove in 28 runs. That came along with 10 doubles and five triples. He also walked nearly as often as he struck out.

For as good as that month was, it pales in comparison to what he did with the Dragons in June. The right-handed hitter out of Stanford hit .354 during the month as he picked up 29 hits in 23 games. After having 15 extra-base hits in May he went out and had 17 of them in June despite playing four fewer games. Graham had six doubles and 11 home runs in 104 plate appearances and drove in 27 runs. That was good for a slugging percentage of .829. He had 17 walks with just 21 strikeouts, leading to a .490 on-base percentage for the month.

All of that put together led to an OPS of 1.319 for the infielder and on the last day of the month it earned him a promotion up to Double-A where he joined Chattanooga. When Carter Graham was promoted his final line with Dayton through 66 games was .322/.450/.614 with 17 doubles, 17 home runs, seven steal, and 60 runs batted in.

He hasn’t let up in his introduction to the Double-A Southern League. Graham has been there for one series and all he did during the week of play was hit .364/.500/.636 with two more home runs and five walks.

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Logan Tanner made his professional debut as a pitcher and it couldn’t have gone much better for him in his inning of relief for the ACL Reds, and in the Dominican Summer League the Reds and Rojos faced off in a doubleheader and split it with a whole bunch of offense taking place.

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The ACL Reds lost 8-1. Box Score

• Steele Hall went 1-3 with a triple and a run.
• Adolfo Sanchez went 1-3 with an RBI.
• Naibel Mariano went 1-3.
• Logan Tanner threw a perfect inning with 3 strikeouts.
• Edwin Cervantes threw a perfect inning with a strikeout.

Game Notes

Logan Tanner, the Reds 2nd round draft pick out of Mississippi State as a catcher, headed to Arizona last summer to transition to a pitcher. He got injured and missed about the next year, but on Monday night he was activated from the 60-day injured list and took the mound in relief of last year’s 2nd round pick, Aaron Watson.

Things went about as well as one could ever hope. He threw 11 pitches. Nine were strikes. He struck out all three batters he faced. Tanner showed three pitches in the game too. His fastball topped out at 98.4 MPH and averaged 96. he threw a few cut fastballs in the low 90’s and a slider in the low 80’s. Batters swung at six of the pitches he threw and missed on five of them. The other was a foul ball.

Edwin Cervantes made his 2026 debut in relief of Tanner. He last pitched on July 25th of 2024. He threw a hitless inning, but did hit a batter. Cervantes was good in 2023 with the DSL Reds, but he really struggled in 2024 out in Arizona. His control was a bit spotting in the DSL and he really struggled to throw strikes in the ACL two seasons ago.

Top Pitch Velocity: Logan Tanner – 98.4 MPH (strike)

Top Exit Velocity: Naibel Mariano – 105.7 MPH (groundout)

Furthest Hit Baseball: Steele Hall – 396 feet (flyout)

The DSL Reds and Rojos split a doubleheader

Game 1: Rojos win 4-3. Box Score

Rojos

• Angel Nunez went 1-2 with 2 walks, a double, a run, and an RBI.
• Carlos Hernandez went 1-1 (left game early – reason unknown).
• Gilventon Josephina went 2-3 with a run and an RBI.
• Jose Colina went 1-3.
• Nayerich Waterfort went 1-2 with a walk and a run.
• Jose Saldana threw 3.0 perfect innings with 3 strikeouts.

Reds

• Sandor Feliciano went 1-3 with a walk, steal (10), and a run.
• Liberts Aponte went 1-2, a HBP, and a steal (6).
• Wanderly De La Cruz went 1-3 with a triple, run, and an RBI.
• Oniel Diaz allowed a run in 4.0 innings with 2 walks and 2 strikeouts.

Game 2: Reds win 18-6. Box Score

Rojos

• Angel Nunez went 3-4 with a walk, home run (3), and 3 RBI.
• Jose Colina went 1-4 with a walk.
• Gilventon Josephina went 2-5 with a run.
• Mikel Nieblas went 1-3 with 2 walks and 2 runs.
• Ronny Felix went 1-3 with 2 walks and an RBI.
• Nishentel Meyers went 1-5 with a run.

Reds

• Juan Caricipe went 3-5 with a walk, double, steal (6), 5 runs, and 2 RBI.
• Angel Salio went 3-6 with a double, steal (13), 3 runs, and 4 RBI.
• Liberts Aponte went 5-6 with a double, run, and 2 RBI.
• Eider Gutierrez went 2-6 with a double, 2 runs, and an RBI.
• Isaac Garcia went 2-5 with a walk, run, and an RBI.
• Angel Barboza went 3-6 with a run and 2 RBI.
• Deinis Chourio went 1-5 with a walk, run, and an RBI.
• Jose Martinez went 2-6 with 2 runs and 2 RBI.
• Omar Guadamuz went 1-5 with a walk and 2 runs.
• Ysaias Escalona threw 5.0 shutout innings with a walk and 4 strikeouts.
• Ariel De La Cruz was charged with 3 unearned runs in 2.1 innings with 3 walks and 4 strikeouts.
• Aitol Lopez threw a hitless inning with 2 walks and a strikeout.

Gameday Notes

The first game of this doubleheader began on Saturday. It was tied 3-3 in the top of the 6th inning when bad weather came through and suspended the game. There wasn’t much offense as the two teams combined for nine hits and only one player had more than one hit in the game. Game two saw a lot of offense with the Rojos picking up nine hits and the Reds having 22 of them against their campus mates.

It was a big day for Angel Nunez, who went 4-6 with three walks, a double, and a home run. He had gone just 1-11 in the previous three games and his batting average dropped under the .300 mark for the first time in his career. He’s got it back up to .325 to go along with a .460 on-base percentages and a .563 slugging percentage with 18 walks and 16 strikeouts in his 22 games played.

Liberts Aponte has a 16-game on-base streak and a 7-game hitting streak. After a bit of a slow start to the season – hitting just .219/.422/.344 in the first 10 games of the year, Aponte has hit .404/.483/.660 in the 13 games since then. His OPS has gone from .766 to .988 during that stretch.

Gilventon Josephina had a slow start to his career. He was hitting just .186/.271/.256 through the first 12 games he played. But in the six games since then he’s gone out and picked up 11 hits in 24 at-bats, hitting .458 with five multi-hit games, five runs scored, and four runs batted in.

Ysaias Escalona has now pitched in seven games this season. In six of them he hasn’t allowed an earned run. In that other game he gave up just one. His ERA now sits at 0.31 on the season. He’s thrown 29.1 innings while giving up 18 hits, hitting two batters, walking eight, and he now has 25 strikeouts.

Top 25 Prospect Rundown

7/7 Game Preview

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The Florida State League and Minor League Baseball have announced that first baseman Ty Doucette has been named the league’s Player of the Week for his series against the Bradenton Marauders from June 29th through July 5th.

The series for Ty Doucette didn’t start out in a flashy way. On Tuesday in Bradenton he went 1-4 with a walk. The next day went a bit better. He again went 1-4 with a walk, but his one hit on that day happened to be a 401-foot solo home run.

Thursday night was when things went to the next level. The left-handed hitter went 2-6 with a double, another 400+ foot home run, and he drove in four runs. Friday night saw Doucette go 1-3 and draw his third walk of the series. On America’s 250th birthday he went out and picked up two more hits and drove in his 6th run of the series.  The infielder capped the series off on Sunday by going 3-5 with a 443-foot home run, two runs scored, and three more runs batted in.

All things totaled up, Ty Doucette hit .385/.467/.769 on the week with four runs scored, a double, three home runs, nine runs batted in, and three walks. The big week for Doucette raised his batting average from .238 to .273 on the year with Daytona. His on-base percentage jumped from .330 to .362. And his slugging percentage went up from .393 to .482. In his 29 games played since joining the Tortugas he’s driven in 24 runs, had five doubles, and now has six home runs to go along with the one homer he his in his single game played out in Arizona to begin the season.

Here are the Cincinnati Reds players to win a Player of the Week Award in 2026:

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When the Cincinnati Reds were in Milwaukee last week, Terry Francona was asked about what has made the Brewers so successful over the years.

“One of the biggest things, and they probably caught (flack) for this going back to (trading Josh) Hader, but then when you come out and win, it shuts people up,” Francona said. “They’re not afraid to trade or jettison. They keep it moving. They’ve been really good at it.”

They’ve made trades that were very unpopular in Milwaukee at the time, dealing All-Stars like Hader, Devin Williams, Freddy Peralta and Corbin Burnes. Last winter, they traded a recent Rookie of the Year candidate in Caleb Durbin. The move landed them their No. 2 starting pitcher, their No. 5 starting pitcher and their starting third baseman.

“Damn,” Francona said about that trade, “They’ve done some good things.”

The Reds, who haven’t made those types of trades over the last few years, have to do some organizational soul searching leading up to the 2026 MLB Trade Deadline on Aug. 3.

When asked last week about the Reds’ plans for the trade deadline, Nick Krall said that it was too early to declare whether or not the team would be buyers or sellers.

If they go on a run over the next month, they’d like to be able to add to the team at the deadline like they did in 2025. That remains the ideal scenario for the Reds, but they’d probably need to go on a June of 2023-like run to put themselves in that position (The Reds went 18-9 in June of 2023. If the 2026 Reds won 18 of their next 27 games, they’d be 59-57. At the trade deadline last year, the 2025 Reds were five games over .500 with a 57-52 record).

Right now, there are 22 games left until the trade deadline. The Reds are seven games under .500, seven games back of a Wild Card spot and in fourth-to-last place in the National League. The three teams below the Reds (the Giants, Mets and Rockies) have already declared themselves sellers.

If the Reds do get hot, a standout relief pitcher who could be a late-game anchor, a leadoff hitter and a center fielder would be their biggest needs, and they could also look for a second baseman, a third baseman and another bat (the fact that they have so many needs isn’t a good sign).

If the season continues down the downward path that it’s on, the Reds have a question to answer.

Is this 2022 or 2024?

Would it be better to make some unpopular moves, deal players with multiple years of team control and try to engineer a quick rebuild? Or do they play it safe like they did in 2024, flip a couple of players on expiring contracts and keep the core of the roster intact?

In retrospect, the Reds should have done more at the deadline in 2024 when the Reds were 52-56 at the end of July. That year, they only flipped Frankie Montas and Lucas Sims. The only meaningful part of their deadline return, in retrospect, was Joey Wiemer, who was later flipped to the Royals as a small piece of the Brady Singer trade.

At the deadline in 2024, India was off the table in trade talks. That would have been the perfect time to trade Alexis Díaz. The Reds held onto Nick Martinez (he went on to return in 2025 on the qualifying offer) as well as a couple of relievers (Justin Wilson and Buck Farmer) in the final years of their contracts.

The Reds’ strategy at the 2024 deadline was very underwhelming in retrospect. In the Montas trade, the Reds got back a big league veteran in Jakob Junis to provide pitching depth instead of maximizing the long-term value of a potential return. Also, the Reds actually had to trade one of their veteran relievers because of an upcoming roster crunch with pitchers about to return from the IL. Even though they had veteran relievers to spare, they only dealt one of them in Sims.

Your direction at the trade deadline — how all-in you go or how much you kick the can down the road — are organizational decisions. 2022 was the only year over the last decade where the Reds really sold a lot at the deadline, and even in 2022 they held onto players on expiring contracts like Donovan Solano, Kyle Farmer and Mike Minor.

The Reds don’t like completely giving up on a season.

Is it time to do things differently?

A big picture look at the Reds’ roster outlook

Here’s the contractual status for some notable Reds

Under contract through 2026: Eugenio Suárez, Tyler Stephenson, Brady Singer, Pierce Johnson, Caleb Ferguson, Brock Burke, Nathaniel Lowe

Under contract through 2027 with player option for 2027: Emilio Pagán

Under contract through 2027: Nick Lodolo

Under contract through 2028: Tony Santillan (injured), Graham Ashcraft (injured), JJ Bleday

Under contract through 2029+: Spencer Steer, Matt McLain, Elly De La Cruz, Noelvi Marte, Hunter Greene, Andrew Abbott, Ke’Bryan Hayes

The roster outlook is almost like a donut. There are a bunch of guys in the final year of their contract. There are a bunch of guys under contract through the rest of the decade. And there’s not much in the middle.

Looking ahead to 2027, considering who will be free agents at the end of this season, next year’s Reds have major needs at catcher (one of the hardest positions to find in MLB) and center field (another one of the hardest positions to find in MLB) and in the bullpen (with three or four relievers set to hit free agency), and they also have big question marks at second base and third base. They don’t have a leadoff hitter right now, and you’re also always looking for another middle of the order bat.

Will the Reds be able to fill all of those needs next winter with the low-payroll setup that they usually have in place?

It feels like the Reds need more ammunition just to build their 2027 roster.

In 2027, they could end up counting on prospects like first/third baseman Cam Collier (21 years old, in Double-A) outfielder/DH Héctor Rodríguez (22 years old, in Triple-A) and center fielder Carlos Jorge (22 years old, in Triple-A), but that would make the Reds an incredibly young and inexperienced team in 2027.

Because the players in the age range of Reds’ top prospects (Chase Burns, Sal Stewart, Rhett Lowder, Edwin Arroyo) are already contributing in the big leagues, the farm system isn’t highly rated right now.

Going back to the payroll question, the Reds went over budget this year to sign Eugenio Suárez. Do they need to get back under budget if the team is out of the playoff mix around the trade deadline? Would a trade deadline sell save the Reds some money that they could reapply in 2027?

Comparisons around MLB to consider

In 2023 and 2025, when the Reds were looking to buy at the trade deadline but ended up only making minor moves (Sam Moll in 2023 and Zach Littell, Miguel Andujar and Ke’Bryan Hayes in 2025), we heard a lot about how few sellers there really were in a given year.

The Rockies, A’s, Marlins, Pirates and White Sox have spent most of this decade rebuilding, and they’ve all typically had available players at the deadline (including Moll, Andujar and Hayes).

Each year, though, there have been a few other teams who weren’t in rebuilds but recognized where they were at in the standings and made a strategic decision to sell in a major way.

Here are a few examples.

-The 2024 Blue Jays were eight games under .500 at the end of July and made eight deals at the trade deadline where they were sellers. In 2025, the Blue Jays made the World Series. The 2024 deals have paid off so much in the long run that The Athletic recently had a story, “How the 2024 trade deadline is keeping the Blue Jays afloat”

-In 2023, the Cardinals dealt four impact pitchers at the trade deadline. In 2025, they traded their closer, a top reliever and two starting pitchers even though St. Louis had a .500 record at the end of July. Those trades restocked the farm system, and now the organization is in an exciting spot with a young roster that’s exceeding expectations in 2026 (47-40 record).

-The 2025 Diamondbacks traded two All-Star hitters as well as an impact starting pitcher when they were seven games under .500 at the end of July. The younger version of Arizona’s roster ended up making a run in August and September and barely missed the playoffs.

-The 2025 Orioles entered the season with big expectations. When they flopped, they punted at the deadline by dealing eight of their best players.

-The 2024 Rays were two games over .500 at the end of July. But because there were so few sellers and because the front office recognized that this team wasn’t a World Series contender, Tampa dealt some really good players with multiple years of team control (Randy Arozerena, Isaac Paredes and Jason Adam), pivoted and acquired three players who are top-20 prospects in the organization right now. Now, even though the prospects they received in these deals haven’t debuted yet, they’re one of the best teams in the AL. Tampa has the ability to trade some of these prospects to go all-in at the deadline this year.

Many of these trades from teams like the Blue Jays, Cardinals, Diamondbacks, Orioles and Rays didn’t pan out for the selling team as the prospects failed to develop into impact big leaguers. But there’s value in getting a lot of shots on goal from a trade perspective.

The last decade of the Reds’ trade history is a reminder of that. While some of their most high-profile trades haven’t been home runs, they acquired Luis Castillo for Dan Straily, Eugenio Suárez for Alfredo Simon and Héctor Rodríguez for Tyler Naquin.

It’s not always the biggest trades that turn out to be the most important. That shows the importance of volume when you’re in position to be a seller at the deadline.

What the Reds would want if they sell at the deadline

Nick Krall has an archetype of player that he values in the draft, in international free agency and in trades.

“We really made a push to focus on better athletes and more starting pitchers and to develop those players in the system,” Krall said a few years ago. “ We want to add as many premium athletes up the middle as possible.”

The Reds are prioritizing up-the-middle position players at catcher, shortstop and center field who have demonstrated a consistent approach at the plate and the ability to get on base, as well as starting pitchers with upside. Offensively, instead of pushing for true sluggers, the Reds value the types of guys who can hit anywhere in the order (leadoff or in the cleanup spot) because of their versatile skill set at the plate.

To get a good potential long-term answer at catcher, center field or in the leadoff spot, you’d have to give up something of value.

One thing to keep in mind: If you prioritize getting big league-ready players in return at the deadline, or players right on the cusp of making their big league debuts, you might sell yourself short in terms of the value you’d be getting. The most valuable young players available in trade talks are typically younger prospects who might not debut for a couple of years.

What the Reds could get in return for some of their players on expiring contracts

Comparable deals for Brady Singer (a durable back-end starter on an expiring deal)

-Chris Paddack to the Tigers in 2025 for a teenage athletic catcher who became the No. 20 prospect in the Twins’ farm system.

-Zach Littell to the Reds in 2025 for a risk/reward A-ball pitcher with intriguing stuff

-Adrian Houser to the Rays in 2025 for a former top-100 prospect who had become a change of scenery guy

Comparable deals for Brock Burke, Caleb Ferguson and Pierce Johnson (solid veteran relievers on expiring deals)

A recent trade deadline trend around MLB is the exploding value of elite setup relievers and closers. But unless one of the Reds’ relievers gets really hot in July, they’d likely fit into a different tier of player from a trade value perspective.

Teams out of the playoff race dealing veteran relief pitchers, especially left-handed pitchers, on expiring contracts is a tale as old as time. The question for the Reds, if they end up as sellers, would be if they only trade one (like they did in 2022), or if they’d be willing to trade in bulk for the first time in a while.

-Kyle Finnegan to the Tigers in 2025 for a No. 15 ranked prospect in the organization who was a recent third-round pick (this deal would be on the high-end of a comparison)

-Caleb Ferguson to the Mariners in 2025 for a 19-year-old pitcher with velocity ranked No. 13 in the organization

-Danny Coulombe to the Twins in 2025 for a recent sixth-round pick

-Phil Maton to the Rangers in 2025 for the No. 27 and No. 28 prospects in the organization (one is a recent seventh-round pick)

Comparable deals for Nathaniel Lowe and Eugenio Suárez (veteran sluggers on expiring contracts)

Lowe looks like the Reds’ most tradable piece. Héctor Rodríguez’s bat looks pretty ready for a big league call up, but having Lowe in the DH spot makes it tricky to get Rodríguez playing time right now. The Reds are very happy to have Lowe’s bat on their roster right now, but priorities could change if the Reds end up selling and thinking ahead toward 2027.

Potential Eugenio Suárez trades would fall into a similar bucket/archetype, but he’s a difficult case study here. Lowe is cheaper and has been much more productive in 2026, so he’d likely have more trade value this year. But is there a team that’s willing to place a bet on Suárez getting hot in the final two months of the season? Also, would the Reds be willing to eat some of the money to get a better return for Suárez?

-Miguel Andujar to the Reds in 2025 for a young starting pitcher flier who was a recent fourth-round pick

-Dylan Carlson from the Rays to the Cardinals for an intriguing but unproductive big league reliever (Shawn Armstrong, who ended up really working out for the Rays)

-Josh Bell to the Marlins in 2023 for a struggling former first-round pick who needed a change of scenery

-Garrett Cooper to the Padres in 2023 for a young big league starting pitcher struggling to piece it together (Ryan Weathers) — this one turned into a coup for Miami

-Jeimer Candelario to the Cubs in 2023 for the No. 14 and No. 16 ranked prospects in the organization

Comparable deals for Tyler Stephenson (catchers rarely get traded, but he could fill a need for a team and would be one of the only catchers available via trade. He’s in a contract year).

What are the Reds going to do at catcher in 2027? Stephenson said at the start of spring training that he hadn’t spoken with the Reds about an extension in a couple of years. Alfredo Duno is a fascinating prospect in Double-A, but he has a ways to go defensively and is still very young. Backup Jose Trevino is under contract for next year. In recent seasons, average catchers have gotten notably more expensive in free agency. Do the Reds make an effort to keep Stephenson for 2027, or do they trade him to add more flexibility that they could use to land a new catcher next season?

-Christian Vasquez to the Astros in 2022 for the No. 29 and No. 30 prospects in the organization — prospect No. 30 (Wilyer Abreu) broke out in the big leagues as a standout outfielder a few years later with Boston

-Nick Fortes to the Rays in 2025 for a speedy upper-level center fielder ranked No. 28 in the organization

-Danny Jansen to the Brewers in 2025 for a No. 25 ranked prospect (a High-A infielder who was a former highly-regarded international free agent)

-Freddie Fermin to the Padres in 2025 for two veteran fill-in starting pitching depth pieces.

The bundle

Since the Reds have so many players on expiring deals and since they’d ideally be able to land a long-term solution at catcher, center field or the leadoff spot in a deadline move, one strategy they could take would be bundling a few of these players together to get a better return.

Trading Singer and Lowe together, or trading a couple of relievers together would help the Reds get a better frontline piece in a trade.

What the Reds could get in return for some players with multiple years of team control

Comparable deals for JJ Bleday (a starting outfielder under team control through 2028)

The problem with trading Bleday would be the fact that he’d be such a cost-controlled starter for them for the next few seasons. You’d be hard pressed to find a more exciting corner outfield option at Bleday’s projected price point than Bleday would be. If you traded him, then the Reds would be back where they were in 2025 when they had to give up a lot to acquire a low-cost outfielder in Gavin Lux. On the other hand, Bleday has a .811 OPS this season despite a cold month of June and would fetch a nice return in a trade. With multiple years of team control, he feels like the type of hitter that the Reds were trying to trade for at the trade deadline in 2023 and 2025. This time, they could ask for the type of prospect return that they were unwilling to part with in 2023 and 2025.

-Lane Thomas to Cleveland in 2024 for a recent second-round pick (a teenage starting pitching prospect with notable upside, ranked eighth in the organization), the No. 22 prospect in the organization (a Low-A shortstop) and a backup utility player type (Jose Tena) who was in Triple-A and was ready for a call-up to the big leagues

-Jake Burger to the Marlins for a borderline top-100 prospect (a polished starting pitching prospect in Jake Eder)

-Jesus Sanchez to the Astros for a big league ready fifth-starter type plus the No. 13 prospect in the organization (a bat to ball/speedy middle infielder who was a recent draft pick out of high school).

Comparable deals for Nick Lodolo (frontline starting pitcher, having an inconsistent but improving season right now, under contract through 2027

The boldest move — trading a core player who’s just hitting arbitration like Spencer Steer or Andrew Abbott would fall more into the “seismic” category — that the Reds could realistically make at the deadline would be dealing Lodolo. If they dealt him, their 2027 rotation would take a major hit. He hasn’t really hit his stride this season, but between 2022 and 2025 he was one of the most exciting young lefties in the game. The talent is obvious, but he’s getting more expensive and will be a free agent at the end of next season. His injury history is something to consider when looking at a potential contract extension for him. Looking at his trade value, the potential of a lockout in 2027 creates some questions. No one knows how the looming threats in 2027 will impact the 2026 deadline, or even what free agency is going to look like at the end of the 2027 season. Are players with two years of team control heading into 2027 as valuable as they’d typically be considering the uncertainty about next year?

-Aaron Civale to the Rays in 2023 for top-100 prospect Kyle Manzardo (a slugging first baseman)

-Zach Eflin to the Orioles in 2024 for the organization’s No. 10 prospect (a recent second-round pick), the No. 17 prospect (another recent second-round pick) plus a recent 10th round pick.

-Tyler Mahle to the Twins in 2022 for prospects Spencer Steer and Christian Encarnacion-Strand

-Erick Fedde to St. Louis as a part of a three-team trade in 2024 where the Cardinals gave up solid big league super utility player Tommy Edman

-Trevor Rogers to the Orioles in 2024 for two borderline top-100, pretty close to big league ready prospects (this deal would be on the high-end of a comparison).

The big question at the end of the day if they end up as trade deadline sellers

How important is it for the Reds to avoid a 90-loss season?

If that’s important to them, which it apparently was in 2024, then they could take a more conservative approach at the deadline. They could swap a reliever or two, deal Lowe to open up a space for a prospect like Rodríguez and keep alive the fighting chance that the team could go on a run over the final two months of the season. They’d keep the core of the roster together and hope that things go better in 2027.

Or, the Reds could sell the daylights out of this team (like the examples of the Blue Jays, Cardinals, Rays, etc.). That type of sell would give the Reds a much better chance of filling the breadth of big needs that the 2027 roster will have.

Which path they’d take would be an organizational decision.

You may not have had the opportunity to watch what the Cincinnati Reds were up to all weekend given the holiday, heat, and literal thousands of other things more enjoyable to do than watch this club try to play the sport of baseball. Thankfully, we here at Red Reporter are going to wrap up the weekend’s news for you right now!

Will Benson was designated for assignment

The Reds called time on the Will Benson experiment for good. He joins the likes of Christian Encarnacion-Strand and Rece Hinds as former touted cornerstone pieces of this existential rebuild that have now been cast aside.

Cincinnati’s front office has been trying for years to find a left-handed outfield bat that’s worth a dang, and they continue to be forced to admit their swings and misses. Jake Fraley didn’t pan out. Gavin Lux cost them a fortune to acquire and they dumped him with egg on their face almost immediately. JJ Bleday has shown flashes but just hit .161/.288/.323 across the entire month of June. In Benson, the Reds initially thought they had something when the former 1st round pick excelled in 2023, but he was simply never able to replicate that small-sample excellence.

Hunter Greene returned and got smacked

Cincinnati hoped their resident ace would ride to their rescue immediately after missing the first half of the season following elbow surgery. The exact opposite happened on Saturday against Baltimore.

Hunter Greene was lit up for 8 ER in just 3.1 IP, his short stint forcing the bullpen to cover copious innings in an eventual loss in front of a holiday crowd mostly there just for the fireworks show that followed. Now, the Reds are immediately in the mode where they question just how much they lean on Greene when mired in last place and closer to 10 games under .500 than to a Wild Card spot.

The Reds lost another home series, this time to a dismal Orioles club

The Orioles are essentially the Reds. Flirting with being 10 games under .500, a dozen games back in their division (and, in Baltimore’s case, a half-game out of last place thanks to beating the Reds in GABP), and figuring out which pieces they’ll be better off selling in the next month.

Still, that Orioles club was good enough to come into an opponent’s ball park and take 2 out of 3, which says just about all you need to know about the Reds at the moment.

Sal Stewart and Chase Burns are All Stars

Sal Stewart and Chase Burns were named to the National League’s All Star roster on Sunday, the two certainly deserving of the honors.

The Cincinnati Reds are in last place with less than a month to the trade deadline

It’s about time we all acknowledged the obivious: this team, this franchise has serious problems. More problems than they have solutions. I’m not suggesting that they go full fire-sale right this minute and deal everyone they can for whatever they can get, but it’s time for them to be strategic sellers.

Nick Lodolo just had his best start of the season. Maybe if he strings together 2-3 more, you think about dealing him. He’ll be a free agent after 2028, and do you really think this club can build itself into a contender for next year?

It’s those types of decisions that will be kicked around the front office in the coming weeks. That, and whether or not Terry Francona and his staff are at all the right fit for the roster as it evolves.

Francisco Urbaez homered for Louisville, Carter Graham homered for Chattanooga, Tyson Lewis had two hits for Dayton, and Ty Doucette remained red hot with another home run in Daytona’s win.

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The Louisville Bats lost 6-2. Box Score

• Francisco Urbaez went 1-4 with a home run (2).
• Michael Chavis went 1-4 with a home run (15).
• Garrett Hampson went 1-3 with a walk.
• Dominic Pitelli went 1-3 with a walk.
• Johnathan Lavallee threw 2.0 hitless innings with a walk and a strikeout.
• Luis Mey threw 2.0 shutout innings with 2 walks and 5 strikeouts.

Top Pitch Velocity: Luis Mey – 100.1 MPH (ball)

Top Exit Velocity: Carlos Jorge – 106.1 MPH (groundout)

Furthest Hit Baseball: Michael Chavis – 387 feet (home run)

The Chattanooga Lookouts lost 12-4. Box Score

• Carlos Sanchez went 1-4 with a walk, run, and an RBI.
• Carter Graham went 3-4 with a walk, home run (19), 2 runs, and 2 RBI.
• Jay Allen II went 1-4 with a walk, steal (15), and a run.
• Yerlin Confidan went 2-3 with a walk and an RBI.

The Dayton Dragons lost 8-2. Box Score

• Johnny Ascanio went 1-4 with a double and a walk.
• Julio Carreras went 1-4 with a walk.
• Marcus Smith went 2-3 with a walk and a run.
• Tyson Lewis went 2-4 with a run.
• Victor Acosta went 2-3 with a walk, 2 doubles, and an RBI.
• Graham Osman threw 2.0 hitless innings with a walk and 3 strikeouts.

The Daytona Tortugas won 9-8. Box Score

• Bernard Moon went 1-4 with 2 walks, 2 runs, and 2 RBI.
• Pablo Nunez went 1-3 with 2 walks.
• Arnaldo Lantigua went 1-4 with a home run (5) and 2 RBI.
• Ty Doucette went 3-5 with a home run (7), 2 runs, and 3 RBI.
• Kyle Henley went 2-5 with a double and a run.
• Drew Davies went 1-5 with 2 RBI.
• Ichiro Cano went 3-5 with a double and a run.
• Anielson Buten went 3-4 with a walk, steal (6), and a run.
• Justin Henschel allowed 2 runs in 4.0 innings with 3 walks and 3 strikeouts.
• Stharlin Torres allowed 2 runs in 4.0 innings with 2 walks and 2 strikeouts.

Game Notes

Ty Doucette extended his hitting streak to eight games. He’s been on fire since June 21st, hitting .367/.475/.653 with four home runs, two doubles, and nine walks in 12 games played.

Arnaldo Lantigua hit .188/.366/.375 in his first nine games back with the Tortugas after spending some time in Arizona. Since then he’s played in seven games and has hit .321/.364/.571 with four doubles and a home run.

Pablo Nunez hadn’t been finding hits too often since he joined Daytona, but he did get a hit on Sunday. He also walked twice for the third straight game. Nunez now has 14 walks and just six strikeouts in his 14 games with the Tortugas. That’s given him a .403 on-base percentage. Unfortunately that’s also coming along with a .173 batting average with zero extra-base hits.

Ichiro Cano has had five hits in the last two games. He only had three hits total in his previous eight games.

Top Pitch Velocity: Mike Villani – 95.0 MPH (ball)

Top Exit Velocity: Ichiro Cano – 106.2 MPH (double)

Furthest Hit Baseball: Ty Doucette – 443 feet (home run, google maps distance)

The ACL Reds had the day off

They are back on the field on Monday night.

The DSL Reds and Rojos had the day off

On Monday morning they will resume their suspended game from Saturday that was tied at 4-4 when the bad weather came through. They will then follow that game with a second game.

7/6 Game Preview

The post Cincinnati Reds Minor League Game Review: July 5, 2026 appeared first on redsminorleagues.com.

Last week against the Brewers, Nick Lodolo threw five shutout innings. On Sunday, in a 3-2 win over the Orioles, Lodolo allowed one run in six innings.

The final line doesn’t show how much more impressive Lodolo looked in Sunday’s outing against Baltimore. He was in command as much as he has been in a while as he filled up the strike zone, got outs early in counts and made his second-longest start of the season.

“I set myself up better in counts to get outs,” Lodolo said. “It sets you up a lot better to do the things you want to do rather than being on the defensive and trying to pick your way back into it.”

Throwing as many first-pitch strikes as he did allowed him to put hitters away in some different ways, and Lodolo felt really good about the way he used his fastball at the top of the zone on Sunday.

Terry Francona was impressed with how “crisp” Lodolo’s stuff was. The Orioles got their only run off of Lodolo on a ground ball that was deflected by third baseman Sal Stewart, who wasn’t able to convert the groundout opportunity with two outs and a runner on third.

Lodolo did run into trouble in the sixth after that single by walking the next two batters to load the bases. He then threw a terrific breaking ball for an inning-ending strikeout.

For most of this season, that pitch — Lodolo’s signature pitch — just hasn’t been clicking. The quality of the pitch that he threw on his final pitch of the game on Sunday to get that strikeout was a very good sign for Lodolo.

“You’ve got to bear down and make some pitches,” Lodolo said. “To make that pitch, a good slider, it definitely feels good.”

***

Over the last week, Elly De La Cruz has looked a lot more like Elly De La Cruz.

In the Brewers series, he hit a 116 mph single, a 113.9 mph double and a 102 mph homer. Then in the Orioles series this weekend, De La Cruz was moving around the field looking as confident, athletic and aggressive as ever.

“When you see him start to want to steal, I think he’s starting to feel better, which is a good thing,” Francona said.

De La Cruz returned from the IL on June 23 after straining his hamstring on June 1. When he returned in late June, he wasn’t moving in quite as dynamic of a way right away.

Now, he’s hitting that gear again.

He’s also hitting at the top of the lineup, in the leadoff spot for the first time since 2023.

“It’s good,” De La Cruz. “It’s a good spot. It’s the same. It’s just at-bats. I like that.”

While the Reds are seven games below .500, De La Cruz feels optimistic about the group.

“We’re fighting,” De La Cruz said. “I definitely believe in the group. We’ve got a great group. We play together. It’s a really strong group.”

***

For years, Edwin Arroyo has had two gloves.

He has his game glove, which is black and looks pretty traditional.

And he has his practice glove, which is bright purple and has a neon message written on the side that says, “Easy money, baby.”

When the Reds were in New York in the middle of June, Arroyo said that he lost the game glove. He started wearing the purple glove in games when the Reds returned home to face the Brewers. Right when he started wearing the purple glove, Arroyo put together a string of good games in late June (six hits in a 15 at-bat stretch).

The saying, “Easy money, baby” is something that one of his coaches from Puerto Rico, former minor league player Benji Gonzalez, used to tell him.

“When you take ground balls, you’re trying to be aggressive, easy money, let’s do it,” Arroyo said. “It’s something you can say.”

Since Arroyo’s debut at the start of June, he’s hitting .247 with a .579 OPS.

“I’m getting more consistent and getting used to the league,” Arroyo said. “Nothing really has changed much. A couple of adjustments. Every pitcher is different with how they attack you. Once I started to know them more, and they know me more, it’s a little different.”

If it feels like Arroyo hits a lot of flare singles to right field, you’re right. It turns out that he’s doing this more than anyone in baseball.

Since the start of June, Arroyo has 12 pull-side singles between 50 mph (setting that minimum to eliminate bunts and swinging bunts) and 100 mph (to eliminate rockets into the gap). That’s the most in baseball, and he’s not even in the lineup every day.

Let’s call these types of hits, “floaters,” like you’d describe the basketball shot.

Behind Arroyo, the hitters with the next-most “floaters” since the start of June are Kazuma Okamoto (11), Pete Crow-Armstrong (9), Seiya Suzuki (9), Nick Gonzales (9) and Jung Hoo Lee (9).

***

A couple of weeks ago, Matt McLain went out to the outfield to shag some fly balls. At the time, before Blake Dunn and Dane Myers went on the IL, playing McLain in center field wasn’t really in the works.

Collin Cowgill watched McLain take those fly balls, and he was really impressed.

“He runs like he’s catching a football pass,” Cowgill said. “You could tell he has a nose for the ball. The best center fielders in the world already know where the ball is going before it’s put in play. That’s the cheat code to being really good. You couple that with extreme speed and elite athleticism, you have the makings of someone who has all the ingredients of being really, really good out there.”

Injuries to Dunn and Myers left the Reds without a center fielder, and the Reds wanted to get the left-handed TJ Friedl a platoon partner.

McLain played center field in college and for a few games in 2024 in the Arizona Fall League. Over the last week, he has played his first three big league games in center field.

“The more he’s out there, he’s going to be one of the best in the game in a short amount of time,” Cowgill said.

Cowgill has taught several Reds infielders how to play the outfield over the last few years, including Spencer Steer, Gavin Lux and Noelvi Marte.

“With Matt, it’s really easy,” Cowgill said. “He’s a super athlete. He has experience there from college and the Fall League. With his middle infield experience, he sees the ball well. He understands the ball entering the zone and cheating toward the location of the pitch. He has the prerequisites.”

***

When you’re on the “developmental list,” you’re basically on the Minor League practice squad. Minor League teams are allowed to have extra players on their roster who aren’t active and then are available if that team has to call someone else up or place someone on the IL.

To start this season, Ivan Johnson was on the developmental list with the Louisville Bats.

JJ Bleday, Blake Dunn, Rece Hinds and Hector Rodriguez were the four outfielders on the roster and Edwin Arroyo, Michael Chavis, Christian Encarnacion-Strand, Garrett Hampson and Michael Toglia were filling the infield spots.

Johnson, a fourth-round pick in the 2019 MLB Draft who posted a .715 OPS in Triple-A in 2025, was the odd man out to open this season.

“Starting that way was a heartbreak for myself,” Johnson said. “There are so many people who got me through that tough time. My faith came in huge. It allowed me to keep going.”

On April 8, a spot on Louisville’s active roster opened up when the Reds called up catcher PJ Higgins to the big leagues. Johnson was activated again in Triple-A. Over the next week, Hinds got called up and Hampson got hurt, which allowed Johnson to play more regularly.

Johnson made the most of his opportunity, posting a .877 OPS in Triple-A. Last week, Triple-A manager Pat Kelly called Johnson to let him know that Johnson was being called up to the big leagues.

In that moment, he remembered the phone call between the two of them from back in March, when Johnson learned that he was going on the developmental list.

“It’s ironic,” Johnson said, “The way those two PK phone calls changed.”

The 2026 edition of the MLB Draft begins this Saturday, July 11th, at 1:00 PM ET. Saturday will see teams make selections through the end of Round 4, while Sunday will conclude the draft with teams making picks 5 through 20 over the course of an 8-hour grind that will begin at 11:30 PM ET.

Because the Cincinnati Reds were slightly better than mediocre during the 2025 season instead of their typical ‘awful,’ they won’t make a selection until pick #18 in Round 1 this time around. So, it’s hard to truly hammer down one particular player they are tied to since there are so many scenarios that could play out over the first 17 picks of the draft. Still, it’s evident that their scouts have been tied to a number of players who most front offices expect will be available around that portion of the draft, and we’ll run down which players have been linked to the Reds in mock drafts through Sunday, July 5th below.

MLB Pipeline: OF Trevor Condon (Etowah HS – Woodstock, GA)

Despite being an extremely talented Georgia high school product with the last name of ‘Condon,’ Trevor is not related to fellow Condon Charlie, whom the Reds were linked to a bit prior to the 2024 draft when they instead selected Chase Burns with the #2 pick. Trevor, to his credit, has carved out his own big of GA lore, and is ranked #13 overall by the MLB Pipeline crew at the moment.

Listed as an OF, Condon also has experience playing 2B, and the 5’11” 175 lb left-handed hitter is currently committed to baseball powerhouse Tennessee at the collegiate level. So, if the Reds were to jump to select him, he’d likely require the full (if not over-slot) bonus to sway him from that decision.

Player Highlights via Perfect Game

ESPN: OF Trevor Condon (Etowah HS – Woodstock, GA)

ESPN’s Kiley McDaniel has Condon on the Reds board, too. He even drops a Kevin McGonigle reference in his blurb, which is #nice.

Perfect Game: RHP Liam Peterson (University of Florida)

To highlight just how ‘all over the place’ this year’s draft is, Perfect Game has the Reds taking Florida righty Liam Peterson with the #18 pick. They have Trevor Condon going #40 overall. MLB Pipeline actually has Peterson going with pick #17 ahead of the Condon pick in their latest mock, though they rank Condon as the #13 player in their draft rankings and Peterson #20.

Science!

Peterson put up a somewhat pedestrian 4.59 ERA across 84.1 IP for the Gators this past season and a mediocre 5.03 ERA across 216.2 IP there in his career. However, he’s 6’5” and 220 lbs with a 60 grade fastball and 65 grade slider, his heater running ‘up to 99 with riding life and carry,’ according to Prospect Porch.

A projectable frame on a college arm with solid, but not extensive use to date? That sounds like something the Reds would be very much up to should Peterson still be around at pick 18.

Perfect Game Scouting Report & Highlights (from his senior year in HS)

The Athletic: RHP Liam Peterson (University of Florida)

Keith Law sees the Reds taking Peterson in his latest mock, too. That’s in part because he’s the best starter available on his board at this point of the draft, and also because he thinks ‘the Reds are a little more likely to take a pitcher than a hitter,’ which certainly tracks.

USA Today: RHP Liam Peterson (University of Florida)

Gabe Lacques has the Reds taking Peterson here, too. Like Law, he’s got Peterson as the pick here despite Condon being still on his board (with the San Diego Padres selecting him at pick #21).

D1 Baseball: SS Justin Lebron (University of Alabama)

Justin Lebron is a name connected with as high as pick #2 overall (Perfect Game), whereas MLB Pipeline has him ranked as the #9 prospect in this year’s draft class. The 6’2” 190 lb shortstop hits from the right side of the plate while playing plus defense at the game’s most important defensive position, and the Pipeline crew doled out 60-grades on each of his Power, Run, Arm, and Field tools.

Lebron swiped 42 bags last season for the Crimson Tide and went a pretty astonishing 69 for 71 on steals over the course of his college career. He was also originally committed to play ball for Rice and study Mechanical Engineering, which is cool as all hell.

He’s got to work on chasing breaking balls, but so much of the rest of his skill set is tough to replicate with anyone else in this draft. If he’s still there at #18, he’s who I’d be selecting.

Perfect Game Scouting Report & Highlights (from his senior year in HS)

The Cincinnati Reds got a brilliant start from lefty Nick Lodolo, a Spencer Steer homer, and a timely insurance run courtesy of noted RBI-guy (and All Star) Sal Stewart and held on to defeat the Baltimore Orioles 3-2 on Sunday afternoon in Great American Ball Park.

The victory made sure the Reds were not once again swept on their own home turf seeing as they’d dropped each of the first two games of the weekend series by three runs each.

Lodolo kept the ball in the yard and mostly over the plate through 6.0 IP of 6 H, ER ball, striking out only 4 but limiting the Orioles to just 2 walks in his time on the bump. Brock Burke and Tejay Anton each fired clean innings to back him up, though closer Emilio Pagan walked a pair, allowed a hit and a sac-fly run to score, and barely escaped with the save to hammer out the 3-2 win.

Steer’s homer, his 14th of the year, came in the 5th inning off Baltimore starter Kyle Bradish and marked the first runs scored of the game. Lodolo yielded a run in the subsequent half-inning, but an Edwin Arroyo single off Bradish in the Bottom of the 8th put a runner on for Stewart, who doubled them in for his 61st ribbie of the season. That proved vital given Pagan’s inevitable struggles to close things out, and the Reds escaped with a win that brought them to 41-48 on the year.

The Reds get Monday off before welcoming the Philadelphia Phillies to town on Tuesday for a three-game midweek series, one that will be backed up by a home series against the Chicago Cubs to close out the season’s first half before the All Star break. Andrew Abbott will toe the rubber on Tuesday for the series opener against the Phils opposite Zack Wheeler, with first pitch in that one slated for 7:10 PM ET.

It’s not uncommon for the Cincinnati Reds to have a pair of representatives in Major League Baseball’s annual All Star Game in July. Frankly, it’s become both common and expected for them to do just that, particularly with a fireballing starting pitcher drafted 2nd overall with high expectations and with a position player lauded for his unmatched skill.

We aren’t talking about Hunter Greene and Elly De La Cruz on this occasion, though. After both missed significant time during the first half of the 2026 season, neither will be making a return trip to the ASG this time around (barring Elly being called upon as a late injury replacement). Instead, the Reds will be sending a pair of outstanding younger players to the game in their stead.

Each of Chase Burns and Sal Stewart have been selected to represent the Reds in the game a week from Tuesday in Philadelphia, the two making their debuts in such an affair. They mark two of the 26 first-timers selected to the respective rosters of the American League and National Leagues, and each is very deserving in their own right.

Stewart entered play on Sunday with 60 ribbies to his credit, which is tied for 7th most in all of Major League Baseball. He’s also smashed 17 homers,swiped 11 bags, played each of 1B, 3B, and 2B, and owns an impressive .348 wOBA and 114 OPS+. The former 1st round draftee and top prospect has flashed his excellent eye at the plate with above-average marks in terms of walk-rate (11.7%) and K-rate (21.7%), and has seemed immediately as-advertised since the moment he became a big leaguer.

Burns, on the other hand, has emerged as simply one of the most unstoppable forces on the mound on the planet so far this season. He entered Sunday with 4.3 bWAR, which was second only to Philadelphia’s Cristopher Sanchez in the game, and owns a 2.40 ERA, 1.08 wHIP, and impressive 10.7 K/9 through 97.2 IP so far as Cincinnati’s resident ace so far in 2026.

Congrats to both, and here’s to this being the first of many appearances for them!

Will Banfield homered for Louisville, Cam Collier had a big night in Chattanooga’s blowout win, Ryan McCrystal had another multi-hit game with Dayton, Jalen Hairston had a 3-hit game in Daytona’s win, and Ryjeteri Merite struck out 11 hitters in the ACL Reds victory.

If you are interested in getting emailed every day during the season with additional game notes for every game and a rundown on how the Cincinnati Reds Top 25 Prospects performed (along with other perks) you can sign up to support the site through Patreon and get all of that for a few bucks a month. If that’s something that sounds interesting you can get more information here.

The Louisville Bats lost 4-1. Box Score

• Hector Rodriguez went 3-4.
• Francisco Urbaez went 1-4.
• Will Banfield went 2-4 with a home run (7).
• Garrett Hampson went 1-3 with a double.
• Trevor Kuncl threw 1.2 shutout innings with a strikeout.
• Zach Maxwell threw a hitless inning with 2 strikeouts.

Top Pitch Velocity: Zach Maxwell – 100.3 MPH (strike)

Top Exit Velocity: Hector Rodriguez – 105.3 MPH (single)

Furthest Hit Baseball: Francisco Urbaez – 372 feet (flyout)

The Chattanooga Lookouts won 11-3. Box Score

• Kien Vu went 2-4 with a walk, run, and an RBI.
• Alfredo Duno went 0-3 with 2 walks and a run.
• Leo Balcazar went 2-5 with a home run (10), 2 runs, and 2 RBI.
• Carter Graham went 2-3 with a walk, HBP, and 3 runs.
• Cam Collier went 2-4 with a walk, double, home run (12), 3 runs, and 3 RBI.
• Jay Allen II went 3-4 with a HBP, run and 2 RBI.
• Yerlin Confidan went 2-4 with a walk and 2 RBI.
• Jared Lyons threw 4.0 shutout innings with 2 walks and 2 strikeouts.
• Steffon Moore threw 2.0 shutout innings with a walk and 3 strikeouts.
• Cody Adcock threw 2.0 shutout innings with a strikeout.

The Dayton Dragons lost 4-3. Box Score

• Ke’Bryan Hayes (rehab) went 0-3.
• Ryan McCrystal went 2-4 with a double and an RBI.
• Julio Carreras went 1-4 with a double and a run.
• Jacob Friend went 1-4 with a double.
• Tyson Lewis went 2-4 with a double, run, and an RBI.
• Marcus Smith went 1-4 with an RBI.
• J.P. Ortiz was charged with an unearned run in 3.0 innings with a strikeout.
• Jonah Hurney threw a hitless inning with a walk and 2 strikeouts.

The Daytona Tortugas won 8-6. Box Score

• Jalen Hairston went 3-6 with 2 doubles, 2 runs, and 3 RBI.
• Arnaldo Lantigua went 2-4 with a double, walk, and a run.
• Ty Doucette went 2-4 with an RBI.
• Drew Davies went 1-4 with a walk and a run.
• Ichiro Cano went 2-5 with an RBI.
• Henry Hunter went 1-2 with 3 walks, a run, and an RBI.
• Mason Morris allowed 2 runs in 6.0 innings of relief with 2 walks and 5 strikeouts.

Top Pitch Velocity: Mason Morris – 97.8 MPH (strike)

Top Exit Velocity: Ty Doucette – 106.3 MPH (single)

Furthest Hit Baseball: Drew Davies – 370 feet (flyout)

The ACL Reds won 7-1. Box Score

• Adolfo Sanchez went 2-5 with a home run (7), a steal (4), 2 runs, and 2 RBI.
• Jirvin Morillo went 1-5 with a triple.
• Juan Brown went 1-4 with a run.
• Eli Pitts went 2-4 with a double, run, and an RBI.
• Naibel Mariano went 1-4 with an RBI.
• Diorland Zambrano went 1-3 with a walk, run, and an RBI.
• Anthuan Valencia went 1-4 with a run.
• Brandon Jaime went 2-2 with a walk and an RBI.
• Ryjeteri Merite allowed one run in 5.0 innings with a walk and 11 strikeouts.
• Moises Castillo threw 3.2 shutout innings with 7 strikeouts.

Game Notes

Reds pitchers combined for one walk and 18 strikeouts in the game.

Ryjeteri Merite allowed one hit but that hit was a solo home run that led off the game. After that he walked one and struck out 11 while giving up zero hits. This is an example of how good the lefty can be. Saturday’s outing was the second this season in which he’s struck out 11 batters.In his 33.1 innings this season he now has 60 strikeouts and a 3.78 ERA. But he’s also hit two batters to go along with 20 walks as he’s battled some consistency with regards to throwing strikes.

Adolfo Sanchez had a .420 slugging percentage in 19 games in May. Since the start of June he’s played in 18 games and is slugging .574 thanks to five doubles and five home runs. He’s also scored 18 runs and driven in 18 runs during that time.

The DSL Reds and Rojos were suspended by rain

The two clubs were facing off against another on Saturday. Both had scored two runs in the 5th inning and the game was tied up at 3-3 with one out in the 6th when the game came to a halt due to the weather. This game will be resumed on July 6th prior to their regularly scheduled game.

7/5 Game Preview

The post Cincinnati Reds Minor League Game Review: July 4, 2026 appeared first on redsminorleagues.com.

A few days ago, Hunter Greene invited Chase Burns over to his house to hang out.

“We talked pitching,” Burns said. “We talked life. He’s older than me. He’s wiser. I’m asking the questions and telling him how I feel about certain things. He’s a great shoulder to talk to.”

Two flamethrowers, two All-Stars, two of the best young pitchers in the game.

They continued building a relationship that the Reds hope leads their rotation for the rest of the decade and beyond.

“I’ve always tried to be there for him,” Greene said. “Hopefully, I’m not a broken record for him. I’ll say, ‘This is what I’ve felt,’ or, ‘This is what I’ve been through.’ I see myself so much in him, not just as a player but as a person. I’d be doing a disservice if I wasn’t trying to help him with certain learning curves trying to navigate the big leagues.”

The return of Hunter Greene from the injured list was muted by his final line — he allowed eight runs in 3 ⅓ innings in his first start of the season on Saturday night in a loss to the Baltimore Orioles as he struggled with command, walked four batters and couldn’t generate enough swing and miss in the at-bats that swung the game. But still, Greene is back, and he gets to team up with Burns to form a new-look top of the Reds’ rotation.

Saturday was the first day that Greene and Burns have been in the Reds’ rotation together at the same time.

In 2025, Greene went on the injured list on June 4. Burns debuted on June 24. In the middle of August, Greene took Burns’ spot in the rotation when Burns went on the injured list (technically, Burns went to the bullpen but didn’t pitch before going on the IL on Aug. 15).

Burns went on to finish the 2025 season in the bullpen as Greene led the rotation in September. Then, Greene missed the first half of the 2026 season with an elbow injury and Burns led the rotation through the first half of this year.

We’ve all wondered for a while what it would look like when Greene and Burns finally team up and take the ball two out of every five days. Greene’s season debut notwithstanding, it should grow into one of the best starting pitching duos in MLB.

“Stuff-wise, those two guys are at the top of the league, if not the top,” closer Emilio Pagán said. “With respect to Misiorowski, Gerrit Cole is always going to be up there, Ohtani, a few other guys. What (Greene and Burns) have with their God-given ability, they’re incredibly gifted pitchers. They both work really hard at preparing themselves. They want to be great. That last layer of wanting to be great is huge. It makes them who they are.”

Greene was just off against the Orioles on Saturday, especially in the fourth inning, as he pitched in his first game of 2026. He wasn’t commanding his fastball well all game and tried to do too much with some pitches early. Late in his start, Francona expected that Greene was getting tired.

The end result was a start where Greene tied his career-high in most runs allowed in a start.

“I didn’t do a good job of channeling the adrenaline,” Greene said. “In my position, I’ve got to be able to do that. Usually, I’m pretty good at that. I failed on the execution part of being able to channel that, stay within my body and stay within myself and not try and do too much. I was constantly behind. Obviously, that’s not a good recipe for success.”

There shouldn’t be much concern about Greene. The velocity was there, he struck out seven and he threw some beautiful sliders that made hitters look silly. He still should be one of the best arms in baseball.

Now, he officially pairs up with Burns.

Since the start of the 2025 season, five starting pitchers have thrown at least 50 pitches of 100 mph+. Two of them are Greene and Burns.

Burns hopes to use being in the same rotation with Greene to his advantage by making the most of his front row seat to watch Greene pitch every five days.

“We’re kind of the same pitcher,” Burns said. “To be able to use him as a scouting report, he goes out there and does his thing and I can use that. We’re always talking. It’s really cool.”

Burns, who was named an All-Star on Saturday, says that he has been watching Greene for years. In college, he was compared to Greene.

“Any time you’re compared to someone like him, it’s awesome,” Burns said. “I’m thankful that I get compared to him.”

Greene was on the 2024 NL All-Star team, posted a 2.76 ERA between 2024 and 2025 and has become a pitcher who Terry Francona says could be one of the best in the game.

Burns (23 years old) holds Greene (26 years old) in very high regard.

“His pitchability, he fills up the strike zone,” Burns said. “He’s calm, cool and collected out there. It’s been really cool to watch. I love seeing it in person.”

Burns can’t wait to see where this partnership goes.

“I’ve looked up to him,” Burns said. “I remember watching him in countless games. We’ve grown really close over the last year-and-a-half. He has given me a lot of wisdom. I kind of look up to him like an older brother.”

Burns is showing all of the talent in the world. Burns has the fifth-best whiff rate in MLB this year, he ranks 12th in strikeouts per nine and he has a 2.40 ERA that ranks sixth in MLB.

After the game on Saturday, Greene spoke at length about being impressed by Burns’ maturity. While Greene made 56 minor league starts, Burns made 13. Greene said that Burns’ ability to be a great student of the game so early in his professional career is special.

There are still just eight starters in the league who are younger than Burns, and he’s already an All-Star.

“He’s continuing to dominate and just trust himself,” Greene said. “I’m happy for him. He deserves it. It’s definitely not going to be his last All-Star Game.”

Samuel Basallo hit a three-run homer in the first inning and the Baltimore Orioles roughed up Cincinnati's Hunter Greene in his first start of the season for an 8-5 win over the Reds on Saturday night.

Gunnar Henderson extended his hitting streak to 10 games with a single on the first pitch of the game, Pete Alonso walked, and Basallo hit his 14th home run of the season.

The Reds pulled ahead 4-3 with a three-run second inning. Jose Trevino doubled home Spencer Steer, TJ Friedl followed with a triple to tie the game, and Elly De La Cruz put the Reds in the lead with a single against Brandon Young (7-2).

But the Orioles scored five times against Greene in the fourth. Adley Rutschman hit his second double of the game to drive in two runs and scored on Alonsos second hit.

Greene (0-1), returning after surgery to remove bone chips from his elbow in March, lasted 3 1/3 innings, allowing eight runs, which ties a career-high, on seven hits. He walked four and struck out seven.

Young, who has won four of his last five decisions, allowed four runs on eight hits and three walks in five innings. He struck out five.

He gave up a walk to Steer and Trevinos third hit to start the sixth, but Grant Wolfram relieved and induced a double play from Friedl to escape the inning.

Rhett Lowder, who was moved to the bullpen when Greene was added to the rotation, pitched three scoreless innings.

Tyler Wells pitched the ninth for his second save.

Chase Burns and Sal Stewart were named to the National League All-Star team. Stewart joins Frank Robinson, Johnny Bench, Chris Sabo and Scott Williamson as the only Reds rookies to be named All-Stars.

Kyle Brandish (5-8, 3.77 ERA) pitches for the Orioles, Nick Lodolo (2-2, 5.05 ERA) starts for the Reds on Sunday.

On Saturday, instead of DFAing a player who had been less productive than Will Benson (there are a few on the 40-man roster), DFAing a Triple-A reliever or moving Tony Santillan to the 60-day IL, the Reds DFAd Benson to open up a roster spot for Hunter Greene.

“We sat here last night for a long time and kind of agonized over a lot of things,” Terry Francona said. “You never can question (Benson) as a person, as a teammate or his work ethic. I think Nick and Brad probably feel the same way — part of us hopes he gets claimed because we love the kid.”

Two things are true about the Reds.

1. Benson has been better this season than some of the options that the Reds are rolling with, and the Reds’ best roster would have had Benson on it. He has a higher OPS (.643) than five regulars in the lineup, and he has simply looked better and had more of a defined role than a couple of players on the 40-man roster. There were other ways to open up this 40-man roster spot.

2. Benson has also run out of opportunities with the Reds and didn’t do enough to get another shot. His time had come to an end.

This sums up the Reds’ low bar problem.

Players who have been performing worse than Benson are in notable roles on the Reds. And Benson just got DFAd.

This is a team where we’ve seen hitters go from Triple-A to the top-third of the big league lineup in a couple of weeks.

Too often, the Reds’ “best” lineup isn’t a good enough lineup.

The Matt McLain experiment in center field is another example. The Reds get their best nine hitters in the lineup versus a left-handed starting pitcher by having McLain in center field. But McLain’s statline for the season (.630 OPS, which is worse than his OPS from 2025) isn’t good enough for a starting center fielder.

The Reds’ best lineup versus lefties has McLain in center field, but that lineup got shut out on Friday night.

The Reds have a roster that doesn’t really fit together. Nathaniel Lowe, Spencer Steer, Noelvi Marte and McLain have effectively been splitting up two spots in the lineup over the last couple of weeks. A power drought from Lowe, a slump from Steer, the inconsistencies of Marte and the poor overall season from McLain have prevented each of them from taking that spot on a full-time basis.

The series of transactions that preceded Benson being DFAd were interesting. Benson was optioned, not Arroyo (.576 OPS and inconsistent defense at second base), when Elly De La Cruz returned from the IL a few weeks ago. Benson had a clearer bench role on the team as the left-handed pinch hitter and backup center fielder, but at the same time his production wasn’t enough for him to stay on the roster. Instead of keeping Benson, the Reds kept Arroyo. Having Arroyo on the roster gave the Reds the flexibility to give De La Cruz more DH days, and it also gave Arroyo a continued runway to click and tap into his upside.

Later that week, Blake Dunn and Dane Myers both went on the IL. The Reds lost two center fielders. TJ Friedl (.531 OPS and worse defense than Benson) was the first call up with more recent Triple-A at-bats under his belt than Benson (who had just been optioned) did at the time, and Friedl became the Reds’ primary center fielder last Sunday. After Myers was injured on Monday, the Reds called up utility player Ivan Johnson (a corner outfielder/second baseman) and decided that McLain was going to back up Friedl. Johnson has been used so far as more of a 26th man.

Then on Saturday, the Reds needed an open 40-man roster spot. Friedl and Johnson, both on the active roster, were safe, as were a few Triple-A relievers. Benson was DFAd.

You can’t hide from the fact that Benson never built on what was a really encouraging 2023 season. Between 2024 and 2026, he posted a .669 OPS and a -1.0 WAR. It’s an easy argument to make that he simply hasn’t done enough. There was a wide open opportunity for Benson to become the starting left fielder in April or the center fielder in May, and he failed to take it.

But would he give the Reds a better shot to win tonight compared to some other players on the roster?

And what does that question say about the rest of the roster?

***

Tony Santillan, out with a significant oblique injury, met with a doctor last night. The Reds didn’t move Santillan to the 60-day IL on Saturday to open up the 40-man roster spot. They’re going to give him the chance to make it back before he’d reach the 60-day point (for him that would be in late August).

“There’s certainly a possibility that he’s going to use all 60 days,” Francona said. “Out of respect for guys like that, unless you’re sure, you don’t just move them.”

***

With Greene back on the roster, the Reds are moving Rhett Lowder to the bullpen up until the All-Star break.

“When we get to next Sunday, we’ll see where we’re at and map it out from there,” Francona said. “We’re not trying to make Lowder a bullpen guy. We’re trying to figure out ways to protect our staff, win games and get through this next week.”

It looks like a win-now move for the Reds, who are fighting to get back into the mix before the trade deadline. Instead of optioning Lowder, who missed the entire 2025 season and also was out for a month with a shoulder injury this year, or giving him a break, the Reds will be managing his innings in the bullpen while using him to win games and keeping the most talented pitchers on the roster.

Lowder was excited about the move and even tried to make himself available to pitch on Wednesday.

“It doesn’t really matter to me, I just want to help the team win and pitch as much as I can,” Lowder said. “I knew Hunter was coming back. I figured something would be done… The end goal is to help this team win games. Getting Hunter back and me providing length out of the bullpen, hopefully we can do that.”

For the next two weeks, it seems like a similar situation to the one that Chase Burns was in last September when he pitched out of the bullpen.

The Reds’ bullpen has been short on high-leverage right-handed relievers, and Lowder could end up getting some important outs between now and the All-Star break.

“Part of it is a mindset, and Rhett has it,” closer Emilio Pagán said. “It’s, ‘I don’t really care who you are, I’m going after you.’ Rhett is extremely talented. He’ll be a huge part of this organization for a long time. He’s an asset for us, whether it’s as a starter or a bullpen arm. He’s one of our best arms. He can help us in any role.”

Chase Burns will start Wednesday against the Phillies, which will be his final start before the All-Star break. Francona said that Burns won’t make the first start after the break, so Burns will get a nice break in the middle of the month (July 9 to at least July 18). It’s a good sign of where Burns is at from a workload perspective that the Reds aren’t using Greene’s return to skip a start from Burns or to try to buy Burns even more rest than that.

The rotation right now is Greene, Andrew Abbott, Nick Lodolo, Brady Singer and Burns.

***
Blake Dunn (elbow) hasn’t been cleared to do baseball activities yet. “He’s just not there yet,” Francona said. “He’s a tough kid. He just still feels it. We’ll go off of symptoms.”

Dane Myers (shoulder) received an injection in his AC joint.

***

Chase Petty, optioned to Triple-A on Saturday, will continue pitching out of the bullpen in the minor leagues. He’ll work on a scripted schedule with the Bats to really get the bullpen routine down.

“We are transitioning him to the bullpen, and we want to be able to do it in a way that’s fair to him,” Francona said. “Throwing back-to-back days and things like that that we haven’t done here. We think he can help us.”

Petty was thrown into the Reds’ bullpen on the fly a few weeks ago when Chase Burns cut his finger on an aluminum can and the Reds needed a long reliever available. Petty did a nice job and pitched well enough to stick around on the active big league roster for a couple of weeks. Still, he’s very inexperienced as a reliever and was still figuring out the role.

Optioning Petty to Triple-A keeps Julian Garcia in the big leagues in the long relief role, and it’ll give Petty some good developmental experience out of the bullpen in Triple-A.

The Reds could have stretched Petty back out as a starter in Triple-A. But with Julian Aguiar healthy and Jose Franco built all the way up, the Reds feel better about their starting pitching depth and have the flexibility to keep Petty in a relief role.

The Cincinnati Reds have been beseiged at Helm’s Deep for four days running. They sit at just 40-47 on the season, mired in last place in the National League Central and 7 full games back of the final NL Wild Card spot. That’s closer to the team in last place in the NL Wild Card standings (the Colorado Rockies at 12 games back) than they are to the St. Louis Cardinals, who occupy that final playoff position.

Today, though, is dawn on the fifth day. At least, that’s what the team must hope lest they barrel into trade season needing to blow this whole operation up and begin once again.

Reds ace Hunter Greene was activated on Saturday ahead of the team’s game against the Baltimore Orioles, their two-time All Star finally ready to make his 2026 debut after his March surgery to clean up debris in his prized right elbow. His minor league rehab starts have been basically perfect, his touted velocity once again there, and the Reds will now turn to Greene to help miraculously turn around their fortunes before it’s all too late.

He’ll start opposite Orioles starter Brandon Young, who pitched to an impressive 2.76 ERA across 29.1 IP (5 GS) during the month of June. That backed up an equally impressive May where he pitched to a 2.86 ERA in 28.1 IP (5 GS) as he has settled in as a force within the O’s rotation.

First pitch is set for 7:10 PM ET this 4th of July, with a massive fireworks display scheduled for after the game at Great American Ball Park.

Hunter Greene is ready for his 2026 debut, as the Reds officially activated the right-hander from the 60-day injured list in advance of his planned start tonight against the Orioles.  In corresponding moves, Cincinnati designated outfielder Will Benson for assignment and optioned right-hander Chase Petty to Triple-A.

Greene had bone chips removed from his throwing elbow during Spring Training, and the procedure came with a projected recovery timeline of around four months.  Things went smoothly enough that Greene was able to make it back just after the start of July, though it is worth wondering if there’s still enough time for the ace to help salvage the Reds’ season.  A hot start for the team has given way to an ugly 20-36 record since the start of May, and Cincinnati’s 40-47 mark puts the Reds last in the NL Central.

The Reds are struggling basically in all aspects of the game, and the leaky bullpen and punchless lineup may be larger issues than the rotation.  That said, the starting five has naturally missed Greene, who has emerged as Cincinnati’s ace over the last two seasons.  This is now two years in a row that Greene has spent an extended amount of time on the IL, as multiple groin strains limited the right-hander to 107 2/3 innings in 2025.

Greene and Chase Burns project as the top two starters for a Reds team that now has a six-man rotation on paper, though the other options aren’t as appealing.  Andrew Abbott, Brady Singer, Nick Lodolo, and Rhett Lowder have all been inconsistent at best, and Lowder will probably be the odd man out of the starting mix now that Greene is back.  The Reds are probably likelier to keep Lowder stretched out as a starter at Triple-A, but conceivably, they could keep him in the majors to help eat some innings of perhaps work as a piggyback starter.

Benson was optioned to the minors two weeks ago, and the DFA indicates that the Reds are willing to cut ties with the outfielder after four seasons with the organization.  Acquired from the Guardians in an inter-Ohio trade back in February 2023, Benson hit .275/.365/.498 with 11 homers over 329 plate appearances in his first season in Cincinnati, and looked like a possible breakout player even though he was largely shielded from facing left-handed pitching.

The offense dried up even in a platoon capacity from then on, as Benson has hit only .200/.279/.390 in 755 PA since Opening Day 2024.  Benson became a little more redundant once the Reds added another left-handed outfield option in JJ Bleday last winter, and the club’s recent experiments with Matt McLain in center field brought another name into the outfield mix.

Benson just turned 28 a couple of weeks ago, has two remaining years of arbitration control, and he has experience at all three outfield positions even though he grades out as an average defender at best.  It is certainly possible another team in need of outfield depth could put in a waiver claim, Benson’s recent lack of offense notwithstanding.  His brief stint with Triple-A Louisville appears to have gotten his bat on track, albeit in the small sample of 21 plate appearances.

Because Benson has more than three years of MLB service time, he has the right to reject an outright assignment in favor of free agency if he clears waivers.  If Benson opts into free agency, however, he would have to give up the roughly $850K he is still owed from his $1.725MM salary for the 2026 season.  It could be that the Reds are counting on Benson to prefer keeping that salary over testing the market, so the club can keep him as Triple-A depth after an outright.

Cincinnati initially kept pace in the tightly-packed NL Central, carrying a 20-11 record through April. An eight-game losing streak to begin May, which included sweeps against division mates Pittsburgh and Chicago, shifted the landscape for the club. The Reds now sit comfortably in fifth place. At 40-46, they’re the only club in the division with a losing record.

The Reds ended a four-year playoff drought last season by earning the final Wild Card spot. The team took advantage of a late-season collapse by the Mets to sneak into the postseason. Cincinnati was quickly dispatched by the eventual World Series champion Dodgers.

Despite the first-round sweep, the club seemed well-positioned to put together a competitive effort in 2026. Cincinnati brought back slugger Eugenio Suarez to add some pop to the lineup. The club re-upped with closer Emilio Pagan following a career-best 32 saves in 2025. Some smaller moves around the edges have paid dividends, including solid production from JJ Bleday and Nathaniel Lowe.

Injuries have been an issue for the Reds. Ace Hunter Greene has yet to pitch in the big leagues following elbow surgery in the spring. Star shortstop Elly De La Cruz missed most of June with a hamstring strain. A hamstring issue also felled Pagan, who missed nearly two months. With Greene expected back this weekend, the Reds are about as healthy as they’ve been all year. It’s going to take an extremely hot July to reverse the club’s fortunes, especially in the fearsome National League. Cincinnati is only six games out of the final Wild Card spot, but there are five teams ahead of them.

Record: 40-46 (2.4% playoff odds, per FanGraphs)

Sell Mode

Impending free agents: Eugenio Suarez, Pierce Johnson, Caleb Ferguson, Nathaniel Lowe, Brady Singer, Tyler Stephenson, Brock Burke

Suarez has a mutual $16MM option for 2027, but it’s hard to imagine Cincinnati picking up their side of the deal, given how his 2026 season has transpired. The veteran infielder languished on the free agent market into February, despite a 49-homer campaign last year. The market seems to have made the right call in not producing a multi-year deal for Suarez. He’s posted a 74 wRC+ through 230 plate appearances. Suarez has always been a high-strikeout bat, but he’s punching out at a career-worst 33.5% clip this year. He’s managed just eight home runs. The defense has been subpar. Suarez is at -5 Defensive Runs Saved through 24 games at the hot corner. He’s likely a DH-only contributor at this point, and the offense hasn’t been good enough to entice another team.

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Hector Rodriguez hit his 19th home run of the year in Louisville’s win, Alfredo Duno doubled and homered for Chattanooga, Kyle McCoy continued his dominant pitching for Dayton in their win, Sheng-En Lin set a career high in strikeouts for Daytona, Steele Hall doubled and drove in two for the ACL Reds, Eider Gutierrez continued to smash the ball in the DSL Reds doubleheader, and Nishentel Meyers hit a grand slam for the DSL Rojos.

Happy 4th of July to those that celebrate. For everyone else, Happy Saturday! We’re going to do a FREE Patreon Preview today as a part of the celebration that I will be having. If you are interested in getting emailed every day during the season with additional game notes and a rundown on how the Cincinnati Reds Top 25 Prospects performed (along with other perks) you can sign up to support the site through Patreon and get all of that for a few bucks a month. If that’s something that sounds interesting you can get more information here.

The Louisville Bats won 3-1. Box Score

• Carlos Jorge went 1-4 with a steal (26) and a run.
• Sam Haggerty went 1-4 with an RBI.
• Hector Rodriguez went 2-4 with a home run (19) and 2 RBI.
• Michael Chavis went 1-4.
• P.J. Higgins went 1-3 with a walk.
• Austin Hendrick went 1-3.
• Dayne Leonard went 1-3 with a run.
• Jose Acuna allowed a run in 6.0 innings with 6 walks and 4 strikeouts.
• Luis Mey threw a shutout inning with a walk and a strikeout.
• Hunter Parks threw a shutout inning with a strikeout.

Game Notes

Hector Rodriguez had two hits in the game. They had exit velocities of 113.7 MPH and 111.2 MPH. His home run was his 19th of the year. That matches the career high that he set last year. He’s done so in 54 fewer games this season.

Carlos Jorge has had hits in all four of his games since being promoted to Triple-A. He struck out five times in the first two games. He hasn’t struck out in either of the last two. Jorge also threw out a runner trying to turn a single into a double.

Jose Acuna made his 2026 debut in Triple-A. He got the job done, though he struggled with his control. Columbus had just one hit against him, but he walked six batters as he managed just 51 strikes on 97 pitches thrown.

Top Pitch Velocity: Luis Mey – 100.0 MPH (groundout)

Top Exit Velocity: Hector Rodriguez – 113.7 MPH (home run)

Furthest Hit Baseball: Hector Rodriguez – 423 feet (home run)

The Chattanooga Lookouts lost 14-7. Box Score

• Jay Allen II went 1-5 with a home run (10).
• Alfredo Duno went 2-4 with a double, home run (17), and 2 runs.
• Cam Collier went 1-3 with a walk and a run.
• Leo Balcazar went 2-3 with a walk, double, run, and an RBI.
• Ruben Ibarra went 1-4 with a run and an RBI.
• Yerlin Confidan went 2-4 with a home run (8) and 3 RBI.

Game Notes

Jay Allen II has homered in three straight games and in four of his last five. In his last six games he’s gone 10-29 (.345) with six extra-base hits. He’s now hitting .272/.361/.451 through 69 games this season.

Alfredo Duno’s taken a liking to Double-A pitching thus far. He’s gone 6-13 with doubles, a home run, and a walk in his first three games since being promoted to join Chattanooga. He’s now got 17 home runs in 68 games. He’s one off of his total of 18 from last year, which he accomplished in 113 games.

Yerlin Confidan, like Duno, connected on his first Double-A homer in this game. His two hits were his first with Chattanooga after going 0-1 as a pinch hitter on Thursday.

The Dayton Dragons won 6-3. Box Score

• Ke’Bryan Hayes (rehab) went 1-3 with a run.
• Peyton Stovall went 1-4 with a walk and a run.
• Ryan McCrystal went 2-4 with a double, run, and 2 RBI.
• Julio Carreras went 1-4 with an RBI.
• Jacob Friend went 1-4 with a double and an RBI.
• Tyson Lewis went 1-4 with a home run (5).
• Marcus Smith went 2-4 with a home run (2).
• Victor Acosta went 1-1 with a run.
• Kyle McCoy threw 5.0 shutout innings with 2 walks and 7 strikeouts.
• Trent Hodgdon threw 1.1 hitless innings with a walk and 3 strikeouts.

Game Notes

Ryan McCrystal continues to rack up hits in his return to Dayton. In the four games of the series against Lansing he’s gone 11-16 with six doubles and a walk.

Tyson Lewis extended his hitting streak to 11 games between Daytona and Dayton. During the streak he’s hitting .319/.385/.574 with six doubles and two home runs.

Kyle McCoy’s 2nd start with Dayton was his worst outing of the year, giving up five runs in 1.2 innings against Great Lakes. That was his final start of May. Since June began he’s thrown 29.0 innings in six games and posted a 1.55 ERA with 19 hits allowed, one home run, 11 walks, and he’s struck out 35 batters. 17 of those strikeouts have come in his last two games.

The Daytona Tortugas lost 5-3. Box Score

• Bernard Moon went 1-2 with a double and a walk.
• Drew Davies went 1-2 with an RBI.
• Ty Doucette went 1-3 with a walk.
• Rafhlmil Torres went 1-3 with a walk and a run.
• Jalen Hairston went 2-4 with a double, run, and an RBI.
• Sheng-En Lin threw 5.0 shutout innings with no walks and 8 strikeouts.

Game Notes

Jalen Hairston has gone 5-9 with a double and a home run over his last two games. Those five hits match the number of hits he had in his previous 36 at-bats.

Sheng-En Lin had one of his best starts of the season on Friday night. It was his third shutout appearance of the season. It was his third game where he walked no one. His eight strikeouts set a new career high, surpassing the seven he had on July 10th of 2025 when he was with the complex league Reds.

Top Pitch Velocity: Lisnerkin Lantigua – 94.4 MPH (ball)

Top Exit Velocity: Jalen Hairston – 104.7 MPH (double)

Furthest Hit Baseball: Jalen Hairston – 400 feet (double)

The ACL Reds lost 7-6. Box Score

• Adolfo Sanchez went 0-1 with a HBP, 2 walks, a steal, and a run.
• Steele Hall went 1-4 with a double, run, and 2 RBI.
• Eli Pitts went 1-3 with a walk and an RBI.
• Diorland Zambrano went 1-1 with a walk, HBP, and 2 runs.
• Yojanser Calzado went 1-2 with a steal (8), run, and an RBI.

Game Notes

The Reds lost by giving up four runs in the final inning. Two relievers combined for this 7th: Hit batter, walk, single, pitching change, hit batter (RBI), hit batter (RBI), 2-run walk-off double. No outs recorded.

Yojanser Calzado is hitting .352/.425/.394 with eight steals in 30 games. He’s only had two extra-base hits all season, but he’s also had 23 singles in 71 at-bats.

Adolfo Sanchez has hit .375/.531/.542 with six walks and five strikeouts in his last eight games. His OPS has jumped up 49 points during that stretch and now sits at .871.

The DSL Reds split a doubleheader

Game 1: 9-8 win. Box Score

• Wanderly De La Cruz went 1-3 with 2 walks, a steal, and 3 runs.
• Angel Salio went 2-5 with a home run (2), 2 steals, 3 runs, and 2 RBI.
• Liberts Aponte went 2-5 with a triple and a run.
• Jealmy Frias went 1-4 with a run, HBP, and 2 RBI.
• Juan Caricipe went 1-4 with a double, steal, and a run.
• Eider Gutierrez went 1-3 with 3 RBI.
• Emdys Rosillo went 1-3 with a walk.
• Angel Barboza went 1-3 with a walk and an RBI.
• Ysaias Escalona threw 2.2 shutout innings with 2 walks and 3 strikeouts.
• Franyer Mendez allowed a run in 3.0 innings with 2 walks and 4 strikeouts.
• Luis Avila threw 2.0 hitless innings with 2 strikeouts.

Game 2: 7-4 loss. Box Score

• Sandor Feliciano went 1-3 with a walk, 2 steals (9), and a run.
• Liberts Aponte went 1-3 with a walk and a run.
• Eider Gutierrez went 2-4 with a double and 2 RBI.
• Enry Torres went 2-2 with a walk, run, and an RBI.
• Jose Martinez went 1-3.
• Jefersson Marte threw 1.1 hitless innings with a walk and 2 strikeouts.

Gameday Notes

The first game was started back on June 25th but suspended by rain in the 4th inning.

Another day and more Eider Gutierrez production. He added three hits and five RBI to his season totals on Friday with the completion of both games. He’s now hitting .420/.517/.652 on the season with 20 runs and 20 RBI in 20 games played.

Liberts Aponte extended his on-base streak to 14 games. He’s now hitting .282/.426/.493 with 18 walks and 19 strikeouts in his 94 plate appearances.

Ysaias Escalona now has a 0.37 ERA this season. He’s thrown 24.1 innings (one earned run) while giving up 12 hits, walking seven, hitting two, and striking out 21. Last year his ERA was 5.26 in 25.2 innings where he walked 17 batters and hit three others.

Luis Avila now has a 1.50 ERA in his 12.0 innings this season (two earned runs). He’s hit one batter and walked no one while striking out 10 this season.

The DSL Reds play the DSL Rojos on Saturday morning.

The DSL Rojos lost 15-7. Box Score

• Carlos Hernandez went 1-4 with a walk and a run.
• Wellmir Lara went 1-2 with 3 walks, a triple, a steal (4), a run, and an RBI.
• Jordan Ouanyou went 1-5 with a double and an RBI.
• Gilventon Josephina went 2-5 with a run.
• Ronny Felix went 2-3 with 2 walks and 2 runs.
• Carlos Goncalves went 1-4 with a walk, triple, run, and an RBI.
• Nishentel Meyers went 2-3 with a walk, double, and a grand slam (2).
• Luis Delgado threw 4.0 shutout innings with a walk and 3 strikeouts.

Game Notes

Nishentel Meyers hasn’t played much this season, but in his nine games he’s taken advantage of his time in the batters box. He’s hit .308/.455/.654 with 11 runs batted in.

Luis Delgado lowered his ERA to 1.80 through his six starts. He’s throw 20.0 innings and given up just 10 hits this season. He has walked 10 and struck out 15.

The DSL Rojos play the DSL Reds on Saturday morning.

Top 25 Prospect Rundown

7/4 Game Preview

The post Cincinnati Reds Minor League Game Review: July 3, 2026 appeared first on redsminorleagues.com.

The Cincinnati Reds welcome the Baltimore Orioles to Great American Ball Park on Friday for a quick three-game set. The 7:10 PM ET series opener will feature southpaw Trevor Rogers on the bump for the O’s, while the Reds will roll out veteran righty Brady Singer.

It’s a matchup that’s somewhat emblematic of the two similarly disappointing teams. Baltimore, at 40-48, sits 13 games out in the American League East division and mired in 4th place, and this is after they had a brilliant run in 2023-2024 with a young core that was the envy of the entire sport. Since then, though, they’ve stalled (or outright regressed), their failures in free agency and trades paired with a litany of pitching injures/problems not able to return them to the top of the highly competitive division.

Trevor Rogers, in many ways, is a pretty good representation of that this season. Last year was his first full year with Baltimore after being acquired from Miami in 2024, and in 109.2 IP he pitched to a brilliant 1.81 ERA and 2.82 FIP to earn some mid-ballot Cy Young Award votes. This year, though, he owns a 4.99 ERA and 3.99 FIP through 79.1 IP, his K/9 down significantly while his H/9 is up over 60% from 2025.

That’s a similar story for Reds starter Brady Singer, really. His strikeouts are down, his hits allowed are way up, and the front-facing 5.12 ERA seems to be a pretty good representation of just how bad he’s been. He allowed 19 homers all last season (in 169.2 IP) and has already yielded 19 in just 77.1 IP in 2026.

Maybe, just maybe, the Reds have the chops to make a run from their current 40-46 position in the NL Central’s cellar. They’ll get Hunter Greene back this weekend, which is huge, and they did finally manage to slay the Milwaukee dragon for a day in their most recent game to prove that no, in fact there is not a tangible curse preventing them from ever beating a good team again.

We’ll find out tonight at GABP!

When the Cincinnati Reds selected Mason Neville in the 4th round of the MLB draft last summer out of Oregon the big calling card in his scouting report was power. The outfielder led all of college baseball with 26 home runs in 2025.

Following the draft he played in 23 games for Single-A Daytona and the power didn’t quite show up in terms of home runs as he only had one of them. But he did add in eight doubles and two triples, so you could see that the extra-base hit power was there.

This season the 22-year-old headed back to Daytona to begin his season and things just did not go well. In 33 games he hit just .155 with two home runs and was slugging just .267. The Reds sent him back to Arizona where he joined the complex level team. While in Arizona things went much better as he hit .418/.535/.909 with seven home runs, six doubles, 15 walks, and 18 strikeouts in 71 plate appearances.

Cincinnati decided that rather than send him back to Daytona that they would promote him up to the High-A Dayton Dragons. Neville has only played in six games so far, but on Thursday night he had his best game since getting back into full-season ball. The left-handed hitter had two hits in four at-bats and both of them were long home runs.

The two balls almost landed in the same spot in right-center. The first one went 413 feet. His home run two innings later went 429 feet. Not a bad night when you hit 842 feet worth of home runs.

Those two homers gave Mason Neville three of them in six games for Dayton. Going back to when he first joined the ACL Reds he’s had six doubles and 10 home runs in just 23 games played. There’s a big difference between hitting in Arizona and hitting in Dayton, or the Midwest League in general (Neville hasn’t played a road game in the league yet). But since leaving Daytona he’s shown an incredible amount of power over a 5-week stretch.

Jose Franco’s Turnaround

In 2026 Jose Franco was sort of forced into a role he likely wasn’t quite ready for. Injuries to the big league pitching staff led to Franco spending time with the Reds this season. His time was inconsistent with Cincinnati and he had a 5.40 ERA in nine games while walking more batters than he had strikeouts.

But during that time he also saw some action in the minor leagues as he was optioned back to the minors a few times. His first two outings with Triple-A Louisville came in April and he allowed nine runs in 7.0 innings. Since then he has been much better. His ERA since those first two games with the Bats is 1.57 over a span of 34.1 innings pitched and he’s struck out 36 batters while giving up just 21 hits.

Bernard Moon’s declining strikeouts

When 2026 began Bernard Moon was back in Daytona for part of a third season. That’s a little misleading, though, as he played in one game with the Tortugas as a 19-year-old in 2024. But he was there for the entire year last season. This season he’s also been with Daytona for the entire year.

Things went well in April as he hit .274/.349/.505, but he also struck out 34 times in 112 plate appearances. That’s a strikeout rate of 30%. Things went south in May as he put up an OPS of just .592 and he had 29 strikeouts in 107 plate appearances. That’s a 27% strikeout rate.

But things have gotten much better since May ended. Moon has played in 21 games since then and he’s hit .288/.424/.515. In those 85 plate appearances he’s struck out just 17 times. That’s a 20% strikeout rate and one that is better than the league average. Not only his is strikeout rate down, but his walk rate is also up. He’s drawn 15 walks during that time. He only had 17 walks ins his first 50 games of the year.

The post Reds MiLB Notebook: Mason Neville hits two long home runs appeared first on redsminorleagues.com.

For many Cincinnati Reds fans, the breakout we saw during Matt McLain’s half-season of excellence in 2023 still resonates quite loudly. It’s hard not to, really – he was a 1st round pick of the club and during his first shot at the big leagues looked like he was an immediate success story, posting a 127 OPS+ with both power and speed while manning a premium defensive position.

In many ways, he was emblematic of a time when it looked – if you squinted a bit – like the Reds knew exactly what they were doing, and it was beginning to pay off in spades.

Things went south quickly, however. That 2023 season was cut short due to injury. The 2024 season was lost altogether due to injury(s). In the two seasons since coming back from major shoulder surgery (and oblique problems likely due to his aggressive swing), McLain has posted just a 75 OPS+ in nearly 900 PA.

He’s also going to turn 27 years old in just a month, and this week the Reds began trying to shoehorn him into playing CF for the first real time since his days at UCLA.

That’s hardly a ringing endorsement of the guy you were supposed to consider the everyday 2B, the player who has been given chance after chance to cement both that role and a role atop the batting order by manager Terry Francona since he arrived on the scene last year. And what we’ve seen lately suggests that the time of McLain as the regular 2B may already be on the outs with prospect Edwin Arroyo gradually settling in there himself.

We asked you this week which of McLain or Arroyo should be given the job as the team’s primary 2B for the rest of the season, and you responded in overwhelming fashion. 82% of you think it should be Arroyo who gets to show what he can do there to build upon the 82 PA of 67 OPS+ work he’s put in so far while getting his feet wet at the big league level.

I don’t think it’s time to write off McLain altogether, at least not yet. He’s been passable against LHP so far this season (.749 OPS) and we know he’s a good defender at both 2B and SS. Heck, if he shows he can figure out how to play a little CF again, too, he’s a wonderful depth piece to have as Francona mixes and matches his lineups and mid-game changes.

However, if the Reds are going to once again stay mired in last place in the division and out of the Wild Card race, it likely behooves the team’s front office to find out what they’ve got in Arroyo as soon as they can, and so far there’s been glimpses that the 22 year old has some chops that may make him a pretty good player for awhile in Cincinnati. If the team’s going to hit a reset button of any size, seeing whether he can cut it as a cornerstone piece now makes a lot more sense than continuing to give an older player another dozen chances to rediscover form.

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Jose Franco threw five shutout innings in Louisville’s win, Jay Allen II homered again for Chattanooga, Mason Neville homered twice in Dayton’s victory, Bernard Moon had a 3-hit night in Daytona’s win, Jirvin Morillo tripled and drove in a run for the ACL Reds in their win, and Deinis Chourio homered for the DSL Reds.

If you are interested in getting emailed every day during the season with additional game notes for every game and a rundown on how the Cincinnati Reds Top 25 Prospects performed (along with other perks) you can sign up to support the site through Patreon and get all of that for a few bucks a month. If that’s something that sounds interesting you can get more information here.

The Louisville Bats won 5-3. Box Score

• Carlos Jorge went 1-4 with a walk, two steals (25), and a run.
• Michael Chavis went 1-4 with a walk, home run (14), and 3 RBI.
• P.J. Higgins went 1-4 with a double.
• Austin Hendrick went 2-3 with a walk, home run (10), steal (5), and 2 runs.
• Will Banfield went 1-4 with an RBI.
• Dominic Pitelli went 1-4.
• Jose Franco threw 5.0 shutout innings with 3 walks and 4 strikeouts.
• Johnathan Lavallee threw 2.0 shutout innings.

Top Pitch Velocity: Jose Franco – 96.8 MPH (lineout)

Top Exit Velocity: Michael Chavis – 105.7 MPH (lineout)

Furthest Hit Baseball: Michael Chavis – 404 feet (home run)

The Chattanooga Lookouts lost 7-3. Box Score

• Kien Vu went 1-4 with a run.
• Alfredo Duno went 1-4 with a double.
• Cam Collier went 1-4 with an RBI.
• Jay Allen II went 2-4 with a home run (9) and 2 runs.
• Leo Balcazar went 1-4 with an RBI.
• Carlos Sanchez went 1-3.
• Nate Peterson threw 3.0 shutout innings with 3 walks and 4 strikeouts.
• Brody Jessee was charged with an unearned run in an inning of work with a walk and a strikeout.

The Dayton Dragons won 7-3. Box Score

• Peyton Stovall went 3-5 with a double and two runs.
• Johnny Ascanio went 0-1 with a BB, HBP, and a run.
• Ryan McCrystal went 3-4 with 2 doubles, a run, and 2 RBI.
• Julio Carreras went 2-4 with a double, run, and an RBI.
• John Michael Faile went 1-4 with an RBI.
• Ariel Almonte went 1-4 with a double.
• Mason Neville went 2-4 with 2 home runs (12).
• Jacob Edwards threw 3.1 shutout innings with 3 walks and 3 strikeouts.

Game Notes

Mason Neville hit 842-feet worth of home runs in this game. The two home runs were hit to nearly the same spot, with the second one going just a little further than the first. Neville is 4-20 (.200) with the Dragons so far. Three of his hits are home runs. He’s also walked four times in his six games with Dayton.

Over his last 24 games Peyton Stovall has been on fire for the Dragons. He’s hitting .346/.450/.704 with 15 extra-base hits, 15 walks, 19 runs, and 21 RBI.

Ryan McCrystal is 9-12 in his three games since returning to Dayton. He’s had five doubles in those three games, including tow in each of the last two games.

Speaking of doubles, Julio Carreras has one in all three of his games since joining Dayton. He’s gone 5-12 with two walks and four RBI in that time.

Jacob Edwards lowered his ERA to 1.28 with his 3.1 shutout innings of relief. The lefty has now thrown 42.1 innings in 13 relief appearances and one start. All of his outings have been more than one inning and all but two have been at least 2.0 innings.

Prior to the game the Dragons got reliever Brady Afthim from Daytona.

The Daytona Tortugas won 11-6. Box Score

• Bernard Moon (pictured above) went 3-6 with a double, home run (8), and 3 runs scored.
• Pablo Nunez went 2-4 with 2 walks and a run.
• Arnaldo Lantigua went 2-5 with a walk and 2 RBI.
• Ty Doucette went 2-5 with a double, home run (6) and 4 RBI.
• Rafhlmil Torres went 1-3 with a double, 3 walks, a steal (9), and 2 runs.
• Drew Davies went 1-5 with an RBI.
• Ichiro Cano went 1-3 with a walk and an RBI.
• Jalen Hairston went 3-5 with a home run and 3 RBI.
• Ian Francis went 1-3 with a double, walk, and a run.
• Abraham Gaitan allowed a run in 3.0 innings with 3 walks and a strikeout.

Top Pitch Velocity: Jordan Little – 97.0 MPH (lineout)

Top Exit Velocity: Jalen Hairston – 107.8 MPH (single)

Furthest Hit Baseball: Ty Doucette – 405 feet (home run)

The ACL Reds won 7-6. Box Score

• Adolfo Sanchez went 1-4 with a run and 2 RBI.
• Jirvin Morillo went 1-2 with 3 walks, a triple, a run, and an RBI.
• Juan Brown went 0-1 with 2 walks, a HBP, and a run.
• Esmith Pineda (MiLB rehab) went 1-4 with a run and an RBI.
• Diorland Zambrano went 1-3 with a walk and a run.
• Yanuel Casiano went 0-2 with 2 walks, a run, and an RBI.
• Reid Clague allowed 1 earned in 3.1 innings with 4 walks and 5 strikeouts.
• Dony Aguilera allowed a run in 3.1 innings with 2 walks.

Top Pitch Velocity: Sergio Villa – 94.3 MPH (groundout)

Top Exit Velocity: Adolfo Sanchez – 109.2 MPH (groundout)

Furthest Hit Baseball: Steele Hall – 340 feet (flyout)

The DSL Reds lost 5-4. Box Score

• Sandor Feliciano went 1-5 with an RBI.
• Liberts Aponte went 2-3 with a walk and a triple.
• Eider Gutierrez went 1-4.
• Deinis Chourio went 2-4 with a home run (1) and 3 RBI.
• Omar Guadamuz went 0-2 with 2 walks and a run.
• Jose Martinez went 2-3.
• Jose Navarrete was charged with 3 unearned runs in 3.2 innings with 3 walks and 3 strikeouts.
• Luisangel Chirino threw a hitless inning with a walk.

The DSL Rojos game was suspended

No continuation date has been placed on the schedule yet. The Rojos trail 9-4 in the 6th where the Cubs scored six runs in the top of the 6th to take the lead. The Cubs return to face the Rojos on July 16th and August 14th.

7/3 Game Preview

The post Cincinnati Reds Minor League Game Review: July 2, 2026 appeared first on redsminorleagues.com.

MILWAUKEE — Jose Trevino, who grew up in Corpus Christi, Texas, is a diehard fan of the San Antonio Spurs. About two months ago, the Spurs beat the Oklahoma City Thunder in Game 7 of the Western Conference Finals.

Trevino was fired up about the win. The moment from the game that meant the most to him was a block from a backup center with just over six minutes left in the game. Luke Kornet finished that game with two points and four rebounds, but the block on a breakaway layup attempt from the Thunder was the play that gave the Spurs momentum for good.

“I’ll buy dinner for that guy if I see him every single time,” Trevino said the next day. “That play right there was the play of all plays. I don’t care what anybody says. The play of all plays.”

There’s something special about a role player whose job is the dirty work getting his moment in the spotlight.

“Understanding your role is one of the biggest things in sports,” Trevino said. “Don’t be what you’re not. Chase that, but be realistic, understand your role and be very, very good at it.”

Two months later, Trevino gets his own moment in the spotlight.

He entered Thursday’s game against the Milwaukee Brewers with a .192 batting average and a .438 OPS. Trevino has gone on the injured list twice in 2026, and the former All-Star wasn’t doing much to fill up the stat sheet.

Still, Trevino has been one of the most valuable Reds behind the scenes with the leadership, the preparation, the pitch calling and the game planning that he brings to the table.

“Everyone knows (that),” Sal Stewart said. “I love Trevino. He’s a great dude. His family is great. His (kids) are the best. I’m so happy he could have a big day like this. He has earned it. He’s someone we rely on.”

Before Thursday, Trevino hadn’t homered since June 8, 2025.

Then, facing the NL Cy Young frontrunner in the series finale in Milwaukee, Trevino crushed a 95 mph slider down the left field line for a three-run homer that broke the game open in the fourth inning as the Reds went on to beat Milwaukee, 7-2.

This series was a frustrating one for the Reds, who lost three out of four and returned home 13.5 games behind Milwaukee in the division standings. That shouldn’t take away from the fact that Thursday was a special day at the ballpark. Chase Burns matched up against Jacob Misiorowski, and two of the best pitchers in baseball in 2026 faced off against each other.

While four of the runs that the Reds put up against Misiorowski were unearned, the Reds still became the first team to put five runs up on the scoreboard against him in 2026 Misiorowski entered the game with a 1.45 ERA and the league lead in strikeouts, FIP, WHIP and hits allowed per nine. He still struck out 10 Reds’ hitters and had several dominant stretches on Thursday, but the Reds got the win.

It was a memorable afternoon in Milwaukee.

***
Last week, when the Reds faced the Brewers in a three-game series in Cincinnati, Milwaukee exposed the biggest flaw in the Reds’ lineup so much that it prompted a team meeting. The Brewers were overpowering the Reds with velocity, taking advantage of a Reds’ lineup that had the worst OPS in all of baseball against pitches that were 95 mph+.

“We made a cognizant team effort to prepare and be ready for that,” JJ Bleday said. “Don’t be afraid to look stupid in a pitch early in the count before you’re in a two strike count.”

Over the last few weeks, the Reds were starting to see more and more velocity from opposing pitchers. The Brewers did that better than any team had against the 2026 Reds, and last week’s Brewers series in Cincinnati was a sign that the Reds needed to make a change.

“It’s more of a mentality than anything,” Bleday said. “It’s about simplifying your approach and doing your best to just hunt that velocity and that pitch. Looking for it in a certain window. You do your best to trust yourself to be ready for that. Then, whatever pops off of that, you’re able to be ready.”

Since that meeting, the Reds have beat Paul Skenes, Jared Jones (whose fastball averages 99 mph) and Misiorowski.

The Reds reinforced that message as they prepared to face The Miz, who’s the hardest thrower in baseball and can hit 105 mph.

The focus, according to Trevino, was “Just be ready.”

***

I haven’t seen a scene like the one at American Family Field an hour before first pitch on Thursday. Misiorowski sprinted from the dugout to the outfield to begin his pregame warmups. The ballpark already felt full. There was already a packed crowd, and the home fans went crazy just for the start of Misiorowski’s stretching routine. They stayed in their seats and watched him warm up as intently as the fans watched the actual game.

It turned out to be a sell-out crowd on Thursday. It was also Misiorowski t-shirt giveaway day, so most of the fans were wearing the same light blue shirt.

This wasn’t your typical Thursday afternoon NL Central matchup environment.

Misiorowski has become one of the biggest stars in the sport. He immediately showed why on Thursday as he got Elly De La Cruz to whiff at a 103 mph fastball to open the game. Misiorowski put him away with three straight fastballs — good morning, good afternoon and good night — that averaged 103.1 mph.

Then, Sal Stewart stepped up to the plate. Misiorowski used a 103.7 mph fastball and a 103.3 mph fastball to get into a two-strike count. Misiorowski then threw Stewart another fastball that Stewart fouled off. Stewart was picking the pitch up. He nodded his head. He was ready.

Misiorowski went back to his fastball, and Stewart muscled an opposite field homer that traveled 402 feet.

“Sal stayed short and to right field,” Terry Francona said. “He’s strong enough to get rewarded for it.”

Before Thursday, Misiorowski had only allowed four hits (all singles) on pitches 102 mph+. Stewart put as good of a swing on Misiorowski’s fastball as there has been all season.

“I don’t know how people see that,” Burns said. “Hitters are insane. Good for Sal.”

He now has 17 homers, which is the second-most by a Reds’ rookie before the All-Star break in team history. Frank Robinson has Stewart beat with his 18 homers before the break in 1956, but Stewart still has nine games to beat that record.

“I just got a good pitch to hit and made a good swing on it,” Stewart said about his homer off Misiorowski. “Just be ready earlier. That’s it. Be on time.”

***

Christian Yelich led off the game for the Brewers, and Burns started him off with four straight fastballs. At one point in that at-bat, during a break between pitches, Burns looked up in the direction of the scoreboard that showed that his fastball velocity was down. Burns was sitting 95-to-96 mph, and he didn’t look as explosive in his first couple of innings on Thursday as he typically is.

“It’s hard early in the morning,” Burns said. “You’re not going to feel your best every time. As the game went on, I got more and more fired up and had to bear down mentally.”

The Brewers had a good plan against Burns, who entered the game with a 2.36 ERA.

“They tried to just swing at his fastball,” Francona said. “When they have a plan, they’re pretty stubborn with it.”

Through the first couple of innings, Burns simply wasn’t getting swing and miss with his fastball. His ball-strike ratio was closer to even than you’d want it. With his fastball not humming, he leaned more into his slider.

The Brewers weren’t hitting it.

“His stuff is really good,” Francona said.

***

One of the first things that Francona recognized about Bleday was the fact that he could really, really hit a fastball. Bleday’s a very hard hitter to beat with velocity. In the first inning on Thursday, though, Misiorowski overwhelmed Bleday with fastballs well over 100 mph.

Bleday stepped back up to the plate to lead off the fourth inning. He decided that he was going to take a shot at a bunt.

“It was a good time to at least give it one shot to try to get the inning going,” Bleday said. “You try to get something more over the plate and put it toward third base. Something to try to jump start an inning and try to get some momentum going because obviously he can bring it.”

The Brewers ended up being charged with an error on the play. But for all intents and purposes, this was Bleday’s first bunt single since 2023, and the third bunt single in his entire career.

The next batter was Eugenio Suárez, who took a fastball for strike three back in the first inning against Misiorowski.

For his second at-bat against the flamethrower, Suárez kept it simple. In a 2-0 count, he delivered an old school swing and hit a chip shot over the head of the second baseman. The opposite field single advanced Bleday to third base.

“We’ll take anything off that kid,” Francona said about that single. “That’s pretty special stuff.”

Marte followed that up with a single that scored Bleday and gave the Reds a 2-0 lead.

Two batters later, Trevino was up at the plate.

Obviously, Trevino hasn’t had the results at the plate that he has been hoping for this season. Still, he has a unique profile as a hitter. “His blessing is also his curse at times,” Chris Valaika said about Trevino during spring training. “He does have a flat swing. He has a knack for making contact. He gets himself in trouble and will end at-bats because he can put the ball in play.”

The beauty of this matchup against Misiorowski was that the pitcher could provide all of the power. Trevino took an aggressive swing against the hardest slider in baseball (95 mph), and Trevino crushed a line drive that was 98.5 mph off of his bat. The homer gave the Reds a 5-1 lead.

It was the highlight of Trevino’s season. But after the game, he had much more to say about the performances of Burns and Stewart than he had to say about himself.

“I thought (Burns) threw the ball really well,” Trevino said. “It’s just who he is. People are starting to see it.”

He added, “Sal is playing like an All-Star.”

***

Grinding through the start, Burns carried a shutout into the fifth inning. He wasn’t finishing at-bats as easily as he typically does, and he benefited from some good plays from the Reds’ defense. Then, Garrett Mitchell homered on a 97 mph fastball that Burns left right over the heart of the plate.

Burns woke up.

“It’s always after a homer,” Burns said. “You feel pretty good and like you’re going to grind through it. Someone gets a big hit on you, and it humbles you. You’ve got to bear down.”

It was like a switch flipped. He started leaning more into his fastball, which was a sign that pitch was playing better than it was earlier in the start.

Burns threw six fastballs harder than 98.5 mph on Thursday. The first one was right after he allowed the homer to Mitchell, and all six of them took place between the fifth and sixth innings.

Burns closed out the fifth inning by overpowering the Brewers. He got Sal Frelick to ground out on a 98 mph fastball, Cooper Pratt to fly out on a 98.1 mph fastball and David Hamilton to stare at a 99.4 mph fastball for strike three. That fastball to Hamilton was Burns’ fastest pitch of the game.

While the Brewers tacked on a run against Burns in the sixth, he exited the game with a 5-2 lead and recorded yet another quality start.

He also earned the victory in the much-anticipated duel against Misiorowski.

“I put (Burns) at the top of any list, not only because he’s one of my best friends,” Stewart said. “Every time he gets the ball, we know he’s going to go attack. What he’s doing is incredible. He goes and competes. That’s my favorite thing about him.”

Maybe all it takes for the Cincinnati Reds to morph back into playing good baseball is to face the absolute best, hardest-throwing arms in the game.

Just days after thumping Pittsburgh Pirates ace Paul Skenes, the Reds took aim at Milwaukee Brewers ace Jacob Misiorowski on Thursday afternoon in the series finale, and their aim was pretty perfect. Sal Stewart homered off the game’s hardest thrower in the Top of the 1st to set the tone, and Jose Trevino later added a 3-run blast down the left-field line to give Cincinnati’s own ace Chase Burns a 5-0 lead that he would not relinquish.

Cincinnati scraped out an eventual 7-2 win, beating the Brewers for the first time in seven chances so far in this disappointing 2026 season. Burns, whose down velocity had him only sitting 95-97 on the day, still battled his way through 6.0 IP of 2 ER ball, and the much maligned bullpen managed to hold things down completely after that to secure the win and avoid yet another sweep.

The win moved the Reds to 40-46 on the season, still miles away from any relevance in the Central and still buried in the crowded wild card standings despite the superexpanded megaplayoff format championed by Rob Manfred. That said, they did get a resurgent performance from the recalled TJ Friedl, finally, as he homered as part of a 2-hit, 2-RBI afternoon, and now they will return home for a two-series homestand where ace Hunter Greene will make his much anticipated return to the club.

So, there’s the slightest hint of optimism, I’d say. At least, there’s a lot more after today’s game than there was just 16 or so hours ago, as the Reds finally, mercifully got the Brewers monkey off their backs for a day.

Reds infielder Matt McLain has suddenly increased his defensive versatility. On Tuesday, he entered the game as a pinch-hitter and then stayed in the game in the center field position. That was his first big league appearance at that spot. Yesterday, he made his first career start in center.

It’s a quick turnaround from idea to implementation. Just last week, manager Terry Francona suggested McLain shag some fly balls in center, per Charlie Goldsmith of Charlie’s Chalkboard. “Just have some fun with it,” Francona told him. “Nobody has a crystal ball.”

McLain seemed game, telling Gordon Wittenmyer of The Cincinnati Enquirer that he had done pre-game work in center before, just for fun. Once the skipper made a note of it, he started doing the work more seriously. “The lineup could be different every day,” McLain said. “So if Tito says go take fly balls in center, you go take fly balls in center.” Just a few days after these conversations, Dane Myers hit the injured list, depriving the club of a righty swinging center field option.

TJ Friedl is currently the club’s primary center fielder, but he is a lefty bat. Friedl’s career splits are fairly neutral but with greater luck on balls in play against southpaws. His strikeout rate, walk rate and isolated power are all better with the platoon advantage. Myers and Friedl had been platooning the spot but the injury to Myers created an opening for the righty-swinging McLain.

As mentioned, McLain had never played center in the majors before. He hadn’t played it in the minors either. He did play some center for UCLA but has been a middle infielder since being drafted. His only center field work since being drafted was in the 2022 Arizona Fall League, when he played three games there.

It’s too early in the experiment to tell if it will work out or not. If it does pan out, it could help McLain stay in the lineup, even if it’s just as a short-side platoon guy. Not too long ago, he looked like he would be a mainstay of the Cincinnati roster. In 2023, splitting his time between second base and shortstop, he hit 16 home runs and stole 14 bases. He slashed .290/.357/.507 for a 129 wRC+. That was buoyed by a .385 batting average on balls in play but that was just his age-23 season. Some regression would be coming in the luck department but continued development could have counteracted that somewhat.

But shoulder surgery wiped out his 2024 and he hasn’t been nearly as productive since. He has a .212/.299/.342 line and 77 wRC+ since the start of the 2025 season. Edwin Arroyo has been getting a lot of the second base playing time, though he’s not exactly running with the job. He has a .268/.321/.310 line and 74 wRC+ thus far in his big league career. But that’s a small sample of just 79 plate appearances and he had a huge .323/.383/.562 showing in Triple-A, so the Reds probably want to let him play and see if he taps into some more offense.

McLain, despite his general struggles, has still been hitting lefties well enough. The righty swinger has a .225/.342/.361 line and 98 wRC+ since the start of last season. That includes a .218/.368/.382 line and 112 wRC+ this year, despite an unlucky .231 batting average on balls in play in that split. He is drawing walks in 17.1% of his plate appearances against southpaws while only striking out 18.6% of the time.

If Arroyo keeps struggling, perhaps McLain ends up back at second base, but the center field experiment gives him another path to carving out a useful role on the roster. He qualified for arbitration last winter as a Super Two guy and is making $2.3MM this year. He is controlled for three more seasons after this one but will be due annual raises, as player salaries almost never go down in the arb system.

Photo courtesy of Katie Stratman, Imagn Images

The Cincinnati Reds have lost four straight games overall and all six of the games in which they have played the Milwaukee Brewers so far in 2026, and now they get to face the single most intimidating pitcher on the planet today. Great!

Following yet another late game collapse on Wednesday evening, the Reds are now seven games under .500 and should almost immediately begin going into hibernation mode, the 2027 season (ha) a much more realistic time to be ambitious than this disastrous 2026 one. And now, this Thursday afternoon, they get to face Jacob Misiorowki, who tops the FanGraphs fWAR leaderboard for pitchers so far this season while also topping the fastball velocity readings by nearly 2.5 mph.

Interestingly enough, it’s Cincinnati’s Chase Burns who sits second on that velocity list. Even though he’s 2.4 mph behind the Miz on average, he’s still one of the elite chuckers in the game, and that’s who Cincinnati will send to the bump in this series finale. There’s at least a bit of hope, if not much, that Burns can once again be the guy who stems the tide and gets this moribund franchise pointed back in the correct direction for at least one day.

It’s beyond bleak, folks. 85 games into the season, up against the most dominant arm in the sport, and knowing a loss would sink you a full eight games under the .500 mark? That’s a season-ending scenario just about any way you look at it, even though Nick Krall will point at the injured list and tell you it’ll be just like making a trade.

Cincinnati’s season isn’t just on the brink, it’s leaning over it.

First pitch on Thursday is a 2:10 PM ET matinee. Here’s how the Reds will line up to start:

Dominic Pitelli had two hits and drove in two runs for Louisville, Chattanooga hit seven home runs as they split a doubleheader, Peyton Stovall had a walk-off hit in extra-innings for Dayton, and Ty Doucette homered for Daytona.

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The Louisville Bats lost 5-4. Box Score

• Carlos Jorge went 1-3 with a walk, HBP, and 2 runs.
• Will Benson went 2-4.
• P.J. Higgins went 1-3 with a walk, double, run, and an RBI.
• Garrett Hampson went 1-3 with a run.
• Dominic Pitelli went 2-3 with a walk, double, and 2 RBI.
• Brandon Leibrandt allowed 2 runs in 4.0 innings with 2 walks and 2 strikeouts.
• Hunter Parks threw a shutout inning with 2 strikeouts.

Game Notes

Will Benson is 7-15  with a walk in his five games since joining Louisville.

Carlos Jorge has had eight at-bats in his two games. Three times he’s come to the plate he has had a hit. In one trip to the plate he walked. In his other five at-bats he’s struck out.

Dominic Pitelli was in a deep slump before Wednesday night’s game. He had gone 0-22 since June 12th for the Bats. He busted out of his slump by getting on base three times to start out July in a positive way.

Top Pitch Velocity: Hunter Parks – 100.4 MPH (ball)

Top Exit Velocity: Francisco Urbaez – 105.1 MPH (groundout)

Furthest Hit Baseball: Dominic Pitelli – 342 feet (double)

The Chattanooga Lookouts split a doubleheader

Game 1: 14-9 win . Box Score

• Kien Vu went 1-3 with a double, 3 walks, and a run.
• Cam Collier went 3-5 with a walk, double, home run (11), 3 runs, and 2 RBI.
• Alfredo Duno went 3-5 with a walk, run, and an RBI.
• Carter Graham went 2-5 with a walk, home run (18), and 2 runs.
• Carlos Sanchez went 2-5 with a home run (10), 2 runs, and 2 RBI.
• Ruben Ibarra went 3-5 with a double, 2 home runs (15), and 5 RBI.
• Cody Adcock allowed a run in 2.1 innings with 2 walks and 3 strikeouts.
• Will Cannon was charged with an unearned run in a hitless inning with 2 walks.

Game 2: 6-5 loss. Box Score

• Jay Allen II went 2-3 with a double, HR (8), 2 runs, and 2 RBI.
• Carlos Sanchez went 1-3 with a run.
• Cade Hunter went 1-3 with a home run (4) and 3 RBI.
• Taylor Floyd threw 4.0 shutout innings with a walk and a strikeout.
• Jose Montero threw a perfect inning.

Gameday Notes

Game one was started on Tuesday but was suspended by rain in the 5th inning. When it resumed it picked up where it left off with both teams hitters just getting into the ball and piling up runs. When the game was over the two clubs had combined for nine home runs, which is the second most in a game in Southern League history according to the Biloxi broadcasters.

The Lookouts hit five home runs in game one. They only had four total hits in game two.

Ruben Ibarra homered on each day of these two games, but both home runs also came in the same game. On June 21st Ibarra entered the day hitting .224/.329/.373. That day he went 2-4 with a walk and a home run. Starting with that game and moving to Wednesday he’s played in nine games. He’s homered eight times and driven in 19 runs. His OPS has been 1.551 over that time. He’s raised his OPS 123 points during that stretch.

Carter Graham didn’t skip a beat in his first two games after his promotion. He went 2-7 with two walks and a home run.

Jay Allen II had gone 7-20 (.350) with four extra-base hits in his last five games.

The Dayton Dragons won 9-8 in 11. Box Score

• Peyton Stovall went 2-4 with 2 walks, a double, home run (7), and 2 RBI.
• Ryan McCrystal went 4-5 with 2 doubles and 2 runs.
• Julio Carreras went 1-4 with a walk, double, and an RBI.
• Yerlin Confidan went 3-4 with a double, home run (7), and 4 RBI.
• Tyson Lewis went 1-4.
• Marcus Smith went 1-3 with a walk, home run (1), and 2 RBI.
• Stephen Quigley was charged with an unearned run in 3.0 innings with 2 strikeouts.
• Jimmy Romano threw a hitless inning with a walk and a strikeout.

Game Notes

This was a back-and-forth game all night long. Dayton scored a run in the bottom of the 9th to tie the game up. Both teams would score a run in the 10th. The Dragons held Lansing without a run in the top of the 11th. Dayton would win on a Peyton Stovall doubled off of the wall in left-center in the bottom of the inning.

Stovall has gone 6-14 in the last four games. He’s also walked six times and driven in five runs in that time frame. When May ended he was hitting just .203/.282/.331 in 34 games played. He’s played in 21 games since June began and he’s been crushing the ball to the tune of .329/.449/.657 with 12 extra-base hits, 15 walks, and 17 strikeouts.

Ryan McCrystal’s return to Dayton has gone well. He’s 6-8 with three doubles and a walk in his first two games.

The Daytona Tortugas lost 4-3 in 10. Box Score

• Kyle Henley went 1-5 with a double and a run.
• Arnaldo Lantigua went 1-5 with a double.
• Ty Doucette went 1-4 with a walk and a home run (5).
• Anielson Buten went 1-4.
• Dylan King went 1-4.
• Dusty Revis allowed 2 runs in 4.0 innings with a walk and 6 strikeouts.
• Dominic Scheffler allowed a run in 2.0 innings with 2 strikeouts.
• Bryce Archie was charged with an unearned run in 3.1 innings with 2 walks and 3 strikeouts.

Game Notes

In the top of the 8th inning Daytona had the bases loaded with two outs, down by a run. Rafhlmil Torres worked a 14 pitch walk to bring in the tying run. That 14th pitch was a wild pitch that hit the catcher in the shin/knee and bounced away. Pablo Nunez, who was on second at the start of the play rounded third base and fell over. The catcher recovered the ball and threw to third, where Nunez then had to try to score at the plate but he was thrown out by about 10 feet to end the inning.

In the top of the 10th inning a wild pitch to the first batter put the go-ahead run at third base with no outs but Daytona couldn’t plate the runner. Bradenton would score in the bottom of the 10th to pick up the win.

Ty Doucette has been on fire over the last 10 days. Since June 21st he’s hitting .323/.462/.548 with eight walks and two home runs.

Top Pitch Velocity: Bryce Archie – 96.7 MPH (foul)

Top Exit Velocity: Ty Doucette – 108.1 MPH (home run)

Furthest Hit Baseball: Ty Doucette – 401 feet (home run)

The ACL Reds had the day off

They are back on the field on Thursday night.

The DSL Reds had the day off

They get back on the field Thursday morning.

The DSL Rojos had the day off

They will return to the field on Thursday morning.

Top 25 Prospect Rundown

7/2 Game Preview

The post Cincinnati Reds Minor League Game Review: July 1, 2026 appeared first on redsminorleagues.com.

MILWAUKEE — Even though he has basically never played the position since college, Matt McLain was the Cincinnati Reds’ best option to start in center field on Wednesday night.

Blake Dunn and Dane Myers went on the IL this week. TJ Friedl, having a poor season overall, has especially struggled against left-handed pitching (.339 OPS). Noelvi Marte has struggled with the routine plays in limited opportunities in center field. In Triple-A, the Reds have one center fielder (Will Benson) who was just optioned to the minor leagues last week and another (Carlos Jorge) who was just called up from Double-A to Triple-A on Tuesday.

Playing McLain in center field is far from ideal. Back in February, it felt like the Reds had good enough center field depth with Dunn, Myers, Benson, Marte and Rece Hinds all candidates at that position. But it turned out that none of those options really stuck in the starting role except for Dunn, who’s now injured, and the Reds ended up unprepared for this regression from Friedl.

Now, it’s McLain’s turn to show what he can do in center field. Having him in center field gets the Reds’ best combination of nine hitters vs. LHP in the lineup tonight.

“The team needed it,” McLain said about playing center field. “I’ve always done whatever I can to help the team win. Playing multiple positions, you see guys like Spencer do it. If you can do that in this game at a high level, it’s a good thing and it helps the team.”

McLain didn’t have an outfield glove. At his locker on Wednesday talking about playing the outfield, McLain thanked Steer for letting him use Steer’s glove.

Steer was sitting at the next locker.

“It’s our glove now,” Steer said.

McLain played some center field in college, and he also played there in the Arizona Fall League in 2024. He’s elite at being fundamentally sound, and Terry Francona expects that to carry over from second base to center field.

“He’s really excited about it,” Francona said. “That’s maybe the most important thing. He’s embracing it, which is good. I think he’s going to be fine. If he’s not, it’s on me.”

I’m really not too worried about McLain’s defense in center field. Because he’s so good at second base, it’ll hurt the Reds’ infield defense to not have him at that position tonight. But Friedl has struggled so much against lefties. Having McLain in center (with Edwin Arroyo at second base) gives the Reds a better shot to win tonight.

The bigger question right now is how much McLain is going to hit.

He looked like he was on to something in early June, hitting .270 with a 1.008 OPS between June 1 and June 15. But since June 15, he’s hitting .115 with a .332 OPS.

“I’ve been hitting the ball hard,” McLain said. “Good at-bats. I’m still taking walks. I’m staying the course to get better, just trying to have good at-bats consistently.”

He needs to do a better job of being on the fastball and really being ready to do damage when he gets a pitch that’s in his wheelhouse. McLain needs to pounce when he gets his pitch to hit.

On the whole this season, McLain has a .644 OPS. In 2025, he posted a .643 OPS.

“I’ve got to play better,” McLain said. “I’ve got to keep it simple, work hard and control what I can.”

Francona has stuck with McLain through his struggles.

“He has shown flashes of what he can do,” Francona said. “We all know it’s in there. It just hasn’t been enough. But man, when you think somebody is a good player, you want to exhaust it. You see guys who go somewhere else and find it. You want them to find it here, especially a guy who can defend like that.”

The plan this year was that the Reds would win with good pitching and good defense. It hasn’t worked out for a Reds’ team that’s six games under .500.

“We came into spring training wanting to have a really good bullpen and catch the ball,” Francona said. “Through nobody’s fault, I’m not blaming anybody, we’ve morphed into our bullpen is beat up and we’re not the defensive team we wanted to be. It shows.”

The Cincinnati Reds have lost three games in a row. They are just 19-34 over their last 53 games played, which is abysmal. They are the owners of an impossibly bad 4-19 record within the National League Central, and they have lost all five games in which they have played the Milwaukee Brewers so far this year.

On Wednesday night, they once again will be tasked with tackling the beast that is Milwaukee, and they’ll send out lefty Andrew Abbott to try to do it. Abbott has settled in rather nicely after a rough first few weeks of the season, and the Reds will need his unique blend of precision and deception to help keep this smack-hitting Brewers lineup on its heels.

Shane Drohan will get the start for Milwaukee. He just faced the Reds last week and held them scoreless over 4.1 IP. He has pitched in both the rotation and bullpen for the Beers so far in 2026, so odds are he won’t be in there much longer than that even if he’s being as effective as he was last time out, so Cincinnati will inevitably be required to take on a Milwaukee bullpen that’s been mostly a Top 5 unit in the game all season for an extended period.

First pitch is set for 8:00 PM ET as ESPN will carry it nationally.

Lineups for both clubs are listed below, with the Reds once again stacking righties against a left-handed starter. That includes the switch-hitting Ivan Johnson, who’ll start in LF for the first big league appearance of his career.

The 2026 Major League Baseball Futures Game rosters have been announced and the Cincinnati Reds only have one player this year on the roster. Catcher and Reds top prospect Alfredo Duno will be in Philadelphia on July 12th to represent Cincinnati.

This will be the second year in a row that Alfredo Duno will be on the Futures Game roster. Last season he was joined by Sal Stewart as the Reds players participating in the event. In that game Duno was the third catcher to make it into the game for the National League and went 0-1.

The 2026 season has been a good one for Duno. After winning the Florida State League’s Most Valuable Player award in 2025 while with the Daytona Tortugas, the Reds moved Duno up to High-A Dayton to join the Dragons in 2026. Things went quite well at the plate for the 20-year-old catcher as he hit .260/.390/.512 through 65 games.  You can see his full season and career stats here.

Even with that line, Duno was a bit inconsistent at times. He had a slow start in April before going nuclear in May. He struggled a bit in the first half of June before turning things around and getting back on track. His 16 home runs were tied for 3rd in the league. He is just one of five players in the league who were under the age of 21 with double-digit home runs (teammate Alfredo Alcantara is also among the group).

On Tuesday he was officially promoted to Double-A Chattanooga. The Lookouts game was suspended in the 5th inning last night by rain and will be resumed later today if the weather cooperates.

The Futures Game has gone through several changes since it was first introduced in 1999. These days the teams are National League Prospects vs American League prospects. They no longer do a Team USA vs Team World. The game is also just a 7-inning contest these days, which is really disappointing as it means that some guys may not even get an at-bat or that some pitchers may only face one batter because of the limited number of innings being played.

If you want to tune into the Futures Game put this information on your calendar:

• When: Sunday, July 12th. 12:00pm ET.
• Where: Philadelphia, Pennsylvania
• Channel: NBC

The post Alfredo Duno will be the Reds representative at the Futures Game appeared first on redsminorleagues.com.

MILWAUKEE — The Milwaukee Brewers are the Cincinnati Reds’ worst nightmare.

Cincinnati is 13.5 games behind Milwaukee in the NL Central standings. The Reds have lost all five games against the Brewers this year, and 32 of their last 44 games against Milwaukee. While the Reds haven’t won the division since 2012, the Brewers won the division in 2021, 2023, 2024 and 2025 and are working on another NL Central title in 2026

The Brewers, a fellow small-market team, are much better than Reds in several areas.

1. Uncomfortable trades, and incredible follow-ups

When people go on a skydiving for the first time, they’re typically pretty nervous. But when you’ve done it before, know what to expect and understand that it will all work out in the end, it’s easier to jumpstep out of that plane.

The Brewers have been making uncomfortable trades for years. During this run of success over the last five years, they’ve traded four former All-Stars (Peralta, Burnes, Devin Williams and Josh Hader).

Initially, the Brewers were panned for those trades. But now, the Brewers have earned the trust that these trades should work out for them in the end.

While Joey Ortiz and DL Hall haven’t become standout players yet, the Brewers did land a starting third baseman and a setup reliever for Burnes. Brandon Sproat, who allowed two runs in 5 ⅓ innings against the Reds on Tuesday and through six shutout innings against Cincinnati last week, still isn’t an established big leaguer. But he’s a promising back of the rotation starter who the Brewers acquired for one year of Peralta (he has a 4.53 ERA this year in New York).

These types of trades have kept the Brewers young and kept the Brewers deep.

The follow-ups have been even more impressive. The Brewers acquired prospect Estreuy Ruiz in the Hader deal and later flipped Ruiz to acquire star catcher William Contreras. They acquired Caleb Durbin in the Williams trade, and then flipped him for three contributors including a potential All-Star starting pitcher in Kyle Harrison.

Another fun trade the Brewers executed was dealing a competitive balance pick and a couple of middle-tier prospects to the Red Sox last year for starting pitcher Quinn Priester, who was terrific in 2025 (he’s out for this entire season due to an injury).

In comparison to the Brewers, the Reds’ trades have been pretty boring. Spencer Steer, Noelvi Marte and Edwin Arroyo were acquired in the 2022 rebuild. Sam Moll was a minor deadline addition who filled a role after a 2023 trade. Ke’Bryan Hayes was supposed to fill a role after the Reds tried to fill a need at third base in 2025, and that trade hasn’t worked out.

The one “fun” trade that the Reds have made recently was the Jonathan India for Brady Singer swap, which has turned out to be a win for the Reds. The Reds need to take more chances on less traditional deals where they swap players of value, which is an approach that has worked so well for the Brewers.

If they’re not in the race, the Reds also need to be more willing to trade their best players.

If the Reds don’t go on a run in July and end up selling at the deadline, the No. 1 question is whether or not they’d be willing to make an uncomfortable trade and trade one of their established good players who has multiple years of team control.

It takes complete organizational buy-in to finalize a trade like that.

Because the Brewers have done it before, it’s easier to generate belief and confidence around those trades.

If the Reds don’t turn things around, then they probably should take a risk and make one of those types of moves.

Is that something that they’re willing to do?

2. International scouting

This might be the Brewers’ single biggest advantage over the Reds.

In 2022, Nick Krall said that in international free agency, the Reds ranked 30th in the production of their international free agents over a ten year period. The one success since then from that era of Reds international scouting was Elly De La Cruz who came out of nowhere by growing and developing unexpectedly during the pandemic.

The Reds overhauled their approach in international free agency around the turn of the decade, prioritizing younger and more athletic players and turning to new leadership (senior director of international scouting Trey Hendricks) to run the team’s program.

They’ve made changes to address this issue, and their international scouting system has improved. Alfredo Duno, Carlos Sanchez and Carlos Jorge are three of the best prospects going in their farm system right now. Héctor Rodríguez was acquired via trade in 2022, but he was an 18-year-old at the time of the trade and the Reds tapped into their knowledge in the Dominican Republic to evaluate him.

It can take a decade to really turn around your international scouting system based on how the system really works. Here’s a piece of an ESPN story about this issue: “Even though players aren’t allowed to sign until they’re 16, teams start scouting them as young as 10 and 11 and come to early deals.”

If you’re scouting young teenagers, then you’re really not getting any payoff at the big league level for another 10 years.

The Reds need an outfielder like Jackson Chourio, a 22-year-old from Venezuela who’s one of the best all-around talents in the game and is a Brewers’ cornerstone. Abner Uribe is an international free agent who’s now a lock down setup reliever in an elite bullpen in Milwaukee.

According to ESPN, the Brewers have the best farm system in all of baseball. That farm system is led by top prospects from the international market, including Jesus Made, Luis Lara and Luis Pena. According to MLB Pipeline, Made is the best prospect in baseball, Pena ranks 19th and Lara is in the top-70.

3. The franchise pillar

Last year, Brewers manager Pat Murphy said about Christian Yelich, “If the fans knew how much responsibility he feels and the way he handles it, if they knew how special this guy is, he’d get a standing ovation every time out. He’s the right dude. He’s just perfect for those guys in there.”

The Reds have a good clubhouse with good leadership. But since Joey Votto retired, the Reds haven’t had a veteran superstar right in the middle of the clubhouse who’s setting a perfect example and backing it up with All-Star caliber play. The way the Reds are built, their best players are young, and their veteran leaders are role players.

The Brewers have Yelich, and they also have 10-year veteran Brandon Woodruff. Those guys are the heart and soul of the Brewers.

4. Bullpen stars out of the blue

Between 2023 and 2025, the Brewers’ bullpen wasn’t that much better than the Reds’ bullpen. The Brewers’ bullpen ranked fourth in WAR, and the Reds’ bullpen ranked eighth.

The Reds saw Alexis Díaz come out of nowhere and develop into an All-Star closer, and Tony Santillan went from being DFAd to pitching at an All-Star level in 2025.

But in 2026, that well ran dry for the Reds while the Brewers maintained one of the best bullpens in baseball.

Star closer Trevor Megill was acquired for a player to be named later, setup reliever Jared Koenig spent time in Indy ball before making it in the big leagues and setup reliever Aaron Ashby was a fourth-round pick. The Brewers’ pipeline has continued to produce elite relief pitching while the Reds had a class of rookie relievers this year that flopped in the big leagues.

5. Inefficient spending

While it works against the Brewers that they don’t take many swings in free agency (their backup catcher is the only big league free agent signing on their roster right now), the Reds are paying Jeimer Candelario ($15 million, not on the team anymore), Ke’Bryan Hayes ($7 million, -.2 WAR), Jose Trevino ($5.25 million, 0.0 WAR) and Eugenio Suárez ($15 million, -.7 WAR).

The Brewers have been investing a lot more of their cash into long-term extensions with young players. They haven’t even reaped the benefits yet of the extra years of team control that they’ll get out of guys like Chourio.

6. What the Brewers are learning — and taking — from the Reds

The Reds do some important things better than the Brewers.

The Reds are getting much more value out of the first round of the draft with standout players like Hunter Greene, Chase Burns and Sal Stewart and contributors like Nick Lodolo, Rhett Lowder and Matt McLain.

2018 first-round pick Brice Turang is a star for the Brewers, but Milwaukee is only getting contributions from two other first-round picks this year (Garrett Mitchell is role player and has a 1.1 WAR, and Sal Frelick has struggled this year and has a -.3 WAR).

The Reds’ biggest advantage over the Brewers is their ability to develop premium pitching talent (Misiorowski has become one of the best pitchers in the game, but like De La Cruz, Misiorowski was a supernova who came out of nowhere).

The Brewers are changing their approach and philosophy toward pitching development. To lead the charge, they hired Bryan Conger away from the Cincinnati Reds to be Milwaukee’s director of player development.

Previously, Conger was a very highly regarded minor league pitching coordinator with the Reds. He was effectively the right-hand man for Derek Johnson and implemented Johnson’s philosophy and vision in the farm system as Johnson coached the big league team (Johnson is currently on a leave of absence).

Now, Conger is executing that plan in Milwaukee’s farm system. He has a great blend of experience with his familiarity with new-school technology and a long resume of traditional coaching.

7. The way the Brewers play the game

While the Reds end up trying things like Noelvi Marte in right field (in 2025), Sal Stewart at first base (in 2025), Edwin Arroyo at second base (this year), Matt McLain in center field (on Tuesday), the Brewers seem to always have great and sure-handed defenders at every spot on the field.

The Reds have never meshed the aggressiveness that they had in 2023 and 2024 with the situational awareness that Terry Francona preaches. The Brewers do both well.

“They’re probably more successful stealing than just about any team in the league, they’re also extremely good at preventing the stolen base, they catch the ball, they’re very athletic,” Francona said. “They present a number of challenges. They’ve put together a really good team. They continue to do it. They know what they want. They know who they are.”

The Reds announced that they have selected the contract of infielder/outfielder Ivan Johnson. He’ll take the active roster spot of outfielder Dane Myers, who has been placed on the 10-day injured list with a left shoulder contusion. The 40-man roster had a vacancy so no corresponding move is required in that department. The Reds also activated right-hander Emilio Pagán from the 15-day IL and optioned righty Zach McCambley. MLBTR covered Pagán’s impending activation yesterday.

Myers suffered his injury in last night’s game. As seen in this clip from Baseball Savant, he runs down a ball off the bat of Andrew Vaughn, making the catch but slamming into the wall at a high speed. He was removed from the game after that, getting carted off the field. Per Gordon Wittenmyer of the Cincinnati Enquirer, X-rays were negative but he was sent to a hospital for further evaluation. The club has not yet provided any updates today but it seems they expect him to need at least ten days to rest.

His injury is obviously unfortunate but it provides an opportunity for Johnson. Now 27, Johnson was a fourth-round pick in the 2019 draft. He was on the prospect radar in the years after that draft selection, with Baseball America having him in the middle area of the club’s top 30 from 2020 to 2022. But Johnson scuffled when he first reached Double-A and fell off the radar.

His bat has picked back up more recently at Triple-A, though with Johnson being a bit old for the level. The switch-hitter has taken 577 plate appearances for Triple-A Louisville dating back to 2024 with a .266/.362/.465 line and 118 wRC+ in that time. He drew walks at a strong 12.3% pace in that span. He struck out in almost 30% of his plate appearances at that level in 2024 and 2025 but has reduced that number to 23.6% here in 2026. He has nine home runs and 11 stolen bases this season. His .290/.388/.489 line on the year translates to a 131 wRC+ but he has gotten some help from a .353 batting average on balls in play.

Defensively, Johnson came up as a middle infielder but he was considered stretched at shortstop and hasn’t played that position since 2022. He has continued to play second base and has been playing all three outfield spots in recent years as well. He also logged eight innings at third base this year.

Without Myers, the Reds have an outfield mix consisting of TJ Friedl, JJ Bleday, Noelvi Marté and Spencer Steer. Johnson can jump into that group while also providing a bit of depth at second base, behind Matt McLain and Edwin Arroyo. Since he has some speed, defensive versatility and hits from both sides of the plate, there are multiple ways he can find his way into the lineup and potentially help the club.

Photo courtesy of Sam Greene, Imagn Images

MILWAUKEE — Chase Petty didn’t have it on Monday against the Brewers. Despite the fact that Petty’s command wasn’t at the level it needed to be in the series opener, Terry Francona stuck with him through the two walks, the wild pitch, the two-run sixth inning, a between inning break, a game-tying homer and two more batters in the seventh inning.

This is where the bullpen and the Reds’ pitching staff is at. This is where it’s been since around the start of May. Francona needed to get a certain amount of length from Petty regardless of what the results were on Monday in Milwaukee in a 5-3 loss. The Reds’ manager had to get a similar degree of uncomfortable in Sunday’s loss in Pittsburgh.

The Reds’ rotation has been fine this year, but the Reds’ average start in 2026 has been just over five innings. The Reds have only had their starting pitcher complete seven innings in a start twice all season, and the starter has only gone more than six innings five times all season.

Nick Lodolo didn’t allow a run in five innings on Monday, but four walks and inconsistent command worked up his pitch count. He said afterward that he needed to go deeper into the game. Petty had to pick up the slack as a result. He has had a nice stretch of games recently, but he had to pitch through it on Monday even though it wasn’t his night.

Your bullpen looks a lot better and more consistent when your starting pitchers go deep into games and there’s less wear and tear on the relievers, but the Reds haven’t had that luxury recently.

They’ve also been missing a closer since Emilio Pagán went on the IL at the start of May.

Add in the fact that the Reds’ offense has the fifth-worst OPS in all of MLB in June, and there’s the formula for how the Reds are in last place in the NL Central, now 12.5 games behind the Brewers and five games out of a Wild Card spot.

There’s one way out of the hole the Reds are in right now. There’s one way back into the playoff race. There’s one way to avoid needing to turn the focus from the 2026 season to the 2027 season over the next month.

Pitch or else.

Having Elly De La Cruz back off the IL will help the offense, and the Reds also dodged a bullet when Eugenio Suárez got good news after a scary hit by pitch on Sunday. Both players are healthy.

But on the whole, the Reds’ lineup doesn’t have enough hot hitters right now. There are question marks and not enough production at second base and in center field. Five players in the bottom-half of the lineup have been splitting playing time recently, which indicates some open roles that hitters haven’t been able to claim.

The offense may have better days ahead of it than there have been in June, but any team-wide leap will need to be led by the pitching staff.

Two reasons why that could be possible are the upcoming returns of No. 1 starter Hunter Greene and closer Emilio Pagán.

Pagán is expected to be activated on Tuesday, and he’s expected to go right back into the closer role.

“It makes sense to do that,” Francona said. “There has been so much unrest. Having him there enables you to work backwards. It should help.”

The last two months have included a lot of scrambling at the back of the bullpen because Francona hasn’t been able to work backwards from a set closer in the ninth inning. The 2026 Reds have 11 pitchers with at least one save this season, which is a team record since the stat became official in 1969.

Relievers have stepped up on occasion in the ninth inning, but overall the lack of defined roles has been a negative for a bullpen that has been the weakness of the 2026 Reds.

The Reds need Pagán to serve as a calming presence and settle down the ninth inning, as well as roles across the entire bullpen.

Fortunately for the Reds, Pagán looked fantastic in his ramp up back to the active roster. He was banged up when he pitched in late April and went through some struggles. He’s healthy now, and he looks more athletic and dynamic going down the mound than he has been since 2025. His delivery is repeatable, and the velocity is there.

Pagán felt so confident about where he stood last week that he offered to Francona to skip his rehab assignment altogether. Pagán only pitched in two minor league games before returning to the active roster, and he’s confident about the team that he’s returning to.

“There’s a reason we had expectations in spring training to compete for the division,” Pagán said. “We haven’t made it easy for ourselves but I believe we have a run in us for sure.”

Greene is set to return from the IL this weekend and make his season debut. If he steps right back in as a No. 1 starter, then he has the ability to elevate the entire pitching staff by pitching deep into games and taking some slack off of everyone in the rotation as well as the bullpen.

“He has shown when he’s out there healthy that he could be one of the best pitchers in baseball,” Francona said.

On Greene’s entire rehab assignment, he didn’t allow a run. The procedure he had in March removed the bone spurs, which are gone now, and he feels healthier and stronger than he has in a while.

“When he’s on the mound he’s up there with the best pitchers on the planet,” Pagán said. “Having a guy like that makes your team better immediately.”

He’s also the most fresh arm on the entire pitching staff. The Reds need him to hit the ground running.

“I have to do what I can do,” Greene said. “That’s where my mindset is at.”

The clock is ticking for the Reds to finally go on a run. Krall built this team with the idea of winning with pitching and defense. The pitching has been solid in 2026, but it needs to step forward in the second half of the season with Greene and Pagán back in the mix.

If the pitching staff doesn’t have a leap in it, then conversation becomes a much different one for the Reds.

The Reds plan to activate Hunter Greene for his season debut during their upcoming weekend series against the Orioles, manager Terry Francona told reporters (link via Gordon Wittenmyer of The Cincinnati Enquirer). They’ll also get closer Emilio Pagán back from the 15-day injured list for tomorrow’s game versus Milwaukee.

Greene underwent arthroscopic surgery to remove bone chips from his elbow during Spring Training. The Reds announced they were hoping he’d return at some point in July. That’ll be the case, as he’s back at the earlier end of that initial timetable.

Cincinnati’s ace took four turns on a minor league assignment, building to 6 1/3 innings and 82 pitches against Minnesota’s Triple-A affiliate yesterday. Greene didn’t allow a run while recording a 13:2 strikeout-to-walk ratio in 14 1/3 frames on the rehab stint. He averaged 98.6 mph on his fastball in his pair of Triple-A appearances.

Greene was a first-time All-Star and top 10 finisher in Cy Young balloting two seasons ago. He battled a right groin injury for a couple months last year but pitched just as well when healthy. Between 2024-25, he turned in a 2.76 earned run average and 29.2% strikeout rate across 45 starts. He was sixth in run prevention and 10th in strikeout rate among pitchers with at least 200 innings over that stretch.

The Reds initially seemed to weather the absence of their ace, racing to one of the hottest starts in MLB. They were 20-11 at the end of April. They’ve been one of the worst teams in the league since then, above only the Rockies with a 17-33 record dating back to May 1. The starting pitching hasn’t necessarily been the biggest problem — the bullpen has been the worst in baseball during that stretch — but they’ve certainly felt Greene’s loss.

Cincinnati starters are 17th in ERA and have the third-highest home run rate in the last two months. Chase Burns has been fantastic, emerging as a legitimate top-of-the-rotation complement to Greene. Andrew Abbott and Rhett Lowder have managed decent ERAs lately but are struggling to keep the ball in the park. Brady Singer had an awful first two months. He looks to have gotten back on track in June but had a tough outing in Pittsburgh yesterday. Nick Lodolo, who missed the first month with a blister issue, has a 5.05 ERA across 10 starts.

The question is whether Greene’s return comes in time to help salvage the season. Cincinnati lost again tonight and faces a likely insurmountable 12.5 game deficit in the division. They’re only five games out of a Wild Card spot but need to surpass six teams along the way. Only the Rockies, Mets and Giants have a worse record in the National League.

Francona didn’t say whether the Reds would go to a six-man rotation. They planned to do that to begin the season until Lodolo’s injury at the end of Spring Training. That said, they’d presumably prefer to give the ball to Greene and Burns as often as possible with their playoff hopes slipping away. They’ll also have an off day next Monday and the All-Star Break after that, so they should have everyone fairly well rested.

Lowder or Lodolo would seem the likeliest candidates to be pushed to the bullpen based on recent form. The rotation picture would probably sort itself out by the trade deadline if the Reds don’t have a great showing in July.

Singer is an impending free agent who is highly unlikely to receive a qualifying offer. He wouldn’t have immense trade value on a $12.75MM salary but has pitched well enough lately that the Reds would probably find someone willing to give up a mid-level prospect (as the Cubs did last week to acquire David Peterson). Lodolo will be due at least a marginal raise on his $4.725MM salary for his final arbitration year. Given his recent form and blister history, the Reds could look to move him as well. It’s less likely they’d trade Abbott, and a move involving Greene or Burns would be an absolute stunner.

Greene is on the 60-day injured list and will need to be reinstated onto the 40-man roster. They already have an opening and would only need to open an active roster spot unless they make an intervening 40-man move. Tony Santillan will be down for an extended time after suffering a significant oblique strain and would be a 60-day IL candidate if they did need the roster spot.

The Reds will also need to option out a pitcher tomorrow to make room for Pagán in the bullpen. Francona has already stated he’ll slot back in as closer after a nearly two-month absence with a left hamstring strain. Pagán had struggled before the injury, giving up 10 runs while blowing three saves in nine chances over 14 innings. Santillan recorded four saves after the Pagán injury; no one else has more than one in that time. Pagán’s propensity for home runs makes him a riskier closer than most, but the Reds can at least feel confident he’ll be around the strike zone. That’s not the case for most of a bullpen that has MLB’s highest walk rate.

Cincinnati Reds centerfielder Dane Myers was taken to a hospital for further examination after he was removed from the field on a cart in the fourth inning of Mondays 5-3 loss to the Milwaukee Brewers after crashing into the outfield wall

Myers made a running backhanded grab on Andrew Vaughns leadoff drive, then hit the wall hard with what appeared to be his left shoulder. He held onto the ball for the out with the Reds leading 1-0.

He was X-rayed here and it came back negative, Reds manager Terry Francona said after the game. Saying that, we sent him to the hospital because he was in so much pain and so uncomfortable.

The kid was really hurt and it wasnt going away. I think they want to check for a lot of things, because you saw how violent it was. He was really in pain, hes already at the hospital. Well see what we can find out.

Myers, who entered hitting .252, accounted for the Reds run with a two-out RBI double in the first.

That was an amazing catch, Francona said. Hes fearless going into the wall, and probably like nobody Ive ever seen. I cant believe he held on, but he paid a pretty big price for it.

TJ Friedl, recalled from Triple-A Louisville on Sunday after outfielder Blake Dunn was placed on the injured list with a right elbow strain, replaced Myers in centerfield.

Ryan OHearn homered twice in a game for the third time in the majors and drove in four runs to help the Pittsburgh Pirates avoid a series sweep with a 9-4 win over the Cincinnati Reds on Sunday.

OHearn put Pittsburgh in front 5-4 in the fifth inning with a 421-foot drive to right off Brady Singer (3-7).

After a 65-minute rain delay with one out in the bottom of the eighth, Pierce Johnson walked Bryan Reynolds and Nick Gonzales before O'Hearn hit a three-run shot to make it 8-4. Esmerlyn Valdz followed O'Hearn by homering for a third straight game.

Mitch Keller (6-5) went six innings for the Pirates, allowing four runs three earned and five hits with four strikeouts and a walk.

Singer gave up five runs and nine hits with six strikeouts in 4 1/3 innings.

Pittsburgh scored four runs before recording an out in the second inning. Gonzales and OHearn started with a pair of singles before Valdz made it 1-0 on a ground-rule double. Tyler Callihan then sent a sinker 412 feet to the right for a three-run homer.

Elly De La Cruz reached safely on a fielding error by Pirates second baseman Brandon Lowe to begin the fourth. A double by Sal Stewart put two runners in scoring position. JJ Bleday took advantage with a two-run single that dropped into right field and cut the deficit to 4-2.

Tyler Stephenson lined an RBI double past a diving Callihan in left field and scored on Edwin Arroyos single down the line in right, tying it at 4 in the fifth.

The Pirates twice failed to score with the bases loaded and no outs. Konnor Griffin grounded into a force out, Lowe struck out and Reynolds grounded to third in the fourth. In the seventh, Henry Davis popped up to short and Griffin hit into a double play.

Reds: LHP Nick Lodolo (2-2, 5.59 ERA) will take the mound Monday for the first of a four-game set in Milwaukee against Brewers LHP Robert Gasser (1-3, 4.50 ERA).

Pirates: RHP Braxton Ashcraft (7-3, 3.07 ERA) will start the first of a four-game series in Philadelphia on Monday against Phillies RHP Aaron Nola (3-4, 5.58 ERA).

PITTSBURGH — The message to Sal Stewart has been pretty consistent throughout the first half of his rookie season. He calls it the best advice that he has received.

He’s often reminded to be himself. His passion, energy and edge have been as consistent as anything about the Reds in 2026.

“When you try to be someone else, you stick out like a sore thumb,” Stewart said. “I’m grateful that I can be who I am and the guys on this team allow me to be who I am. I enjoy coming to the yard and playing with this team. I love the game. I love what I do. I’m grateful for what I do. I try not to take it for granted and go out there and play hard and play to win.”

Entering Sunday, Stewart is hitting a solid .252 with a .795 OPS that ranks third among qualified rookies in the National League. His 57 RBI this season are tied for fourth-most by any NL rookie before July since the stat became official in 1920, and Stewart’s 57 RBI rank tied-for-fifth in MLB this season.

“I’m still getting better,” Stewart said. “I’ll always get better. I haven’t played to the best of my ability. It’s been good, but I feel like there’s a lot more in there that I have to tap into for the rest of the season. I make adjustments. They make adjustments. It goes back and forth. Every day is a new day.”

Francona has seen a knack for RBI in Stewart, and the 22-year-old has been a presence in the middle of the Reds’ lineup all season.

Stewart has had his waves of success and struggles this season, but on the whole he’s having a very positive year.

“I think I’m in a good spot,” Stewart said. “You’ve got to stay focused. Once you keep your focus on winning, everything pans out. I’d like to play better. I also understand that halfway through, I’ve had a good year so far. I know there’s better for myself in there, but I just want to go out there and give it my all.”

His RBI are one example of Stewart’s ability to deliver winning plays, and his reliability on defense is another example. His ability to play a solid third base following Ke’Bryan Hayes’ injury is one of the more important developments of the Reds’ season, and Stewart’s versatility allows Francona to put the Reds’ best nine hitters into the lineup on a given day.

Stewart is a great competitor, and he’s one of those guys who has a way of being extremely confident even when he’s in the middle of a cold stretch at the plate.

“When you know you’re a good hitter, and he does… I’m not saying he’s arrogant, I think he knows he’s a good hitter,” Terry Francona said. “When it doesn’t go well, he gets mad, but he knows he’s a good hitter.”

***

Eugenio Suárez and Chase Petty got the headlines on Saturday, but Edwin Arroyo quietly played the best game of his young big league career.

“He went the other way with a double, which is always good,” Francona said. “He got the bunt down to third. That was after we had talked to him about it. I thought the other night, he tried to do a little too much (when he bunted against the Brewers in the ninth inning). We said, ‘Slow down, here’s all you’ve got to do.’ He did. The intent was there, and he executed it. When you play the game right, then other good things happen.”

He needs to keep driving the ball like he did on Saturday, and the consistency of his defense is a critical area for him to develop. Overall, he’s getting better.

“He’s a good hustler,” Francona said. “The other night, he hit that ball and ended up going to second. I said, ‘I never want to take away your hustle because I love it, but that was awfully close. We’re down three.’ He looks at you and goes, ‘Ok, I’ve got you.’ He listens, which is really good.”

***

Through the first half of his rookie season, Rhett Lowder has a 4.81 ERA through 12 starts.

“I’m on the right path process wise over the last couple of games,” Lowder said. “I’m trending the right way. There are some things I want to get better at. I’m learning a ton. There’s always stuff I feel getting better.”

His rookie season was interrupted by a shoulder injury that kept him out for about a month.

“I’ve been staying in the fight really well, especially after missing so much time,” Lowder said. “That can tough, staying in the fight after not being in some situations for a while. I’ve had outings where it might not go my way early, but I can find a way to keep us in it and give us a chance to win in the long run.”

Lowder sees a few positives with his pitching. His slider has been a good putaway pitch against righties, and the changeup has been a good putaway pitch against lefties. He’s able to freeze hitters with fastballs to end and at-bat, which is a testament to his command and the variety of ways that Lowder can defeat a hitter. He’s a very good mixer and matcher.

On the negative side, his walk rate has been higher than expected this year, and he’s allowing more line drive contact than you’d want. There have been games where he had poor execution on a pitch over the plate that cost him as he allowed a game-changing swing. In each of his last two starts, Lowder has been undone by one big inning.

“I was struggling to find the zone and searching for the pitch to get be back in (the zone),” Lowder said. “It’s non chases and getting into a deep count. You see across they game that hitters are trying to wait pitchers out because the zone has shrunk a bit. Swing percentages are down across the league. You have to fill it up, be on the attack and not waste too many to put them away.”

Lowder, who made his big league debut in his first year pitching professionally (2024) and then missed the 2025 season due to injury, is still so early in his career.

He’s learning as he goes, especially with his approach to game planning for specific opponents.

“You read into what these teams do to different (pitchers), but the approach for one (pitcher) may be completely different from how they approach you,” Lowder said. “You have to do a bit of self-reflection. What are teams going to do against me? You have to be humble. You can’t think you’re really good at this. You have to be honest with yourself, and you might not be doing great and what teams may try to target.”

***

Before this weekend’s series against the Pirates, a big talking point was how the Reds had the worst OPS in MLB versus pitches 95 mph+. The Reds’ lineup was the worst in the league against velocity. Then, the lineup went out and had big games against two flamethrowers in Paul Skenes and Jared Jones.

The offense has made an adjustment.

“They’re trying to be aggressive to the fastball,” Francona said. “Not chasing. Seeing it and hitting it. Sometimes, that helps you lay off the other stuff, if you’re committed to something that’s over the plate.”

***
Nick Lodolo isn’t quite vintage Nick Lodolo yet.

After missing the first six weeks of the season due to a blister issue, Lodolo has a 5.59 ERA across his nine starts in 2026.

“It hasn’t been clean by any means,” Lodolo said. “I wish I was throwing the ball better. It’s getting better. I’d like to see it turn around ASAP, but that’s not how the game works. I’m showing up every day and doing the stuff that I’ve had success doing, getting back to that stuff mechanically. Mindset wise, it’s the mindset of whatever it takes that day to win. That’s where I’m at.”

His biggest gift is a unique breaking ball for a left-hander that gets huge swings and misses when he’s rolling. That pitch is typically the bellwether for Lodolo. It hasn’t quite been humming this year, so his chase and whiff rates are way down.

“When I’m going, (my breaking ball) is my calling card,” Lodolo said.

Because he was coming back from the blister, the Reds capped the number of breaking balls that Lodolo was allowed to throw when he ramped up toward his season debut back in May. Lodolo is a long pitcher with a lot of moving pieces. He says that repeatability is key with that pitch. He’s just not at the point yet where that pitch is rolling.

“You expect yourself to go out there and instantly start spinning it great,” Lodolo said. “That hasn’t been the case. It’s been getting better. I’ve been working every day on it. You want it to turn immediately.”

The silver lining is that even without his best breaking ball, Lodolo has scratched and clawed to give the Reds some solid starts recently. A couple of his starts over the last month weren’t good enough, but six innings of one-run baseball against the Mets, 6 ⅔ innings of three-run baseball against the Braves and 5 ⅓ innings of two-run baseball against the Diamondbacks were positive nights.

He was on track for another positive start last week against the Brewers. He threw four shutout innings but exited the game with a wrist contusion (the swelling went down, and his wrist is in a good spot entering his start on Monday). Against the Brewers, Lodolo got three whiffs on three swings against his breaking ball.

Lodolo has a huge ceiling, and he posted a 2.82 ERA across his final 14 starts last season. He’s working to get back to that level.

“I want to hit that stretch where I go on a run and it’s a good quality month to boost you to where you want to go,” Lodolo said.

***

Blake Dunn, who had the fourth-highest WAR among Reds’ position players despite being in Triple-A or a big league bench player until late May, landed on the injured list on Sunday with an elbow injury. He’s heading back to Cincinnati for further evaluation, and the Reds will need more information before setting a timeline for Dunn to return.

In a corresponding move, the Reds called up TJ Friedl from Triple-A.

“It’s never easy for a guy to be told you’re going to Triple-A,” Francona said. “He handled it like you’d expect Friedl to handle it. When he walked in today, I don’t know that I’ve ever seen that many people that excited to see somebody. That’s pretty cool.”

In 18 games in Triple-A, Friedl hit .271.

“It’s a blessing to be back here (in MLB),” Friedl said. “I’m grateful that God opened the door for me to be back here with these guys. It’s incredible to be back in this clubhouse.”

It seems like Francona’s preference is to keep Noelvi Marte and JJ Bleday in corner outfield spots. As a result, it looks like Friedl and Dane Myers are the Reds’ options in center field (I didn’t see Matt McLain working out any more in center field this weekend in Pittsburgh). Friedl and Myers platooned in center field back in April, and it could make sense to go back to that now.

The other center field candidate in Triple-A before the Reds called Friedl was up was Will Benson, who was optioned last week (Héctor Rodríguez is a corner outfielder). Prospect Carlos Jorge is in Double-A and is a name to know down the road.

***
Here’s the most interesting storyline of the next week for the Reds: What happens in the rotation when Hunter Greene returns from the IL?

If all goes well for Greene today in his rehab game in Triple-A, he expects to be ready to return to the Reds’ rotation this week. July 3 is a likely return date for him.

The Reds’ rotation right now is Chase Burns, Andrew Abbott, Nick Lodolo, Brady Singer and Rhett Lowder.

The Reds could go in a few different directions when Greene is ready. They haven’t publicly revealed what the plan is going to be.

Do you go with a six-man rotation through the All-Star break, or even the trade deadline? Do you try a piggyback system? Do you option a starting pitcher to Triple-A? Do you move a starting pitcher to the bullpen? Do you skip a start of one of the young starting pitchers (Burns or Lowder) to help manage their inning totals for the season?

It’s an interesting and fascinating decision.

Also, there will need to be a corresponding move in the bullpen when Emilio Pagán is activated next week.

***
Ke’Bryan Hayes (back) has made it through the “Watkins program,” and he’s set to face pitchers on Wednesday and Thursday as he ramps up toward a rehab assignment.

Graham Ashcraft (elbow) will be re-scanned on Tuesday.

Brandon Williamson hurt his finger working out recently, which Francona said set him back by about 10 days.

The Reds are placing outfielder Blake Dunn on the injured list with an elbow injury, according to Charlie Goldsmith of Charlie’s Chalkboard. Taking his place on the active roster is TJ Friedl, who’s being recalled from Triple-A.

Friedl was optioned to Triple-A on June 3rd amidst profound struggles at the plate. Through his first 178 plate appearances in 2026, Friedl was batting just .179/.259/.256 with a wRC+ of just 42. Part of that was due to bad luck. Friedl is batting .230 on balls in play this year, which falls well below league average and Friedl’s .278 career BABIP. However, the bigger culprits for Friedl’s downturn were his strikeout and walk rates trending in the wrong direction. Friedl walked 11.8% of the time in 2025 but just 7.3% of the time this year before being optioned. His 23.6% strikeout rate is easily a career high.

Friedl was an above-average hitter as recently as last year, so the Reds were hoping that a brief detour to the minor leagues could help get him back on track. That has mostly come to fruition. Friedl is batting .271/.370/.471 with a 122 wRC+ in 81 plate appearances at Triple-A. While that’s a small sample, Friedl is back to walking at an above average rate and has also shown more typical power with three home runs and a .200 isolated slugging percentage. His 21.0% strikeout rate at Triple-A is still high for him, but on the surface, it looks as though Friedl has corrected the issues that were plaguing him early in the season.

Having established himself as a big league regular in August 2022, Friedl entered this season with well over three years of service time. Although this optional assignment was unexpected, the three weeks and change Friedl spent in the minors won’t affect his timeline for free agency. The 39-42 Reds have played exactly half of their schedule, so there are more than enough games for Friedl to reach four years of service in 2026. Assuming he doesn’t get optioned again, Friedl remains on track for two more years of arbitration in 2027-28 before reaching free agency.

Dunn, who’d been covering for Friedl in center field, heads to the IL for the time being. Dunn left Friday’s game against the Pirates in the sixth inning with elbow discomfort. It’s possible he sustained the injury in the bottom of the fifth while attempting to throw out Henry Davis at home on a Brandon Lowe sacrifice fly (video courtesy of MLB.com). Dane Myers took over in center in the bottom of the sixth.

Dunn is batting .282/.335/.387 with a 98 wRC+ in 155 plate appearances. That’s only a few ticks below league average and far better than Friedl’s production before he was optioned. While Dunn doesn’t have enough plate appearances to qualify, he’s actually the Reds’ fourth-most valuable position player by fWAR on account of his defense, having accrued 5 Defensive Runs Saved and 2 Outs Above Average in 293 defensive innings.

Per Goldsmith, Dunn will undergo evaluations on his elbow back in Cincinnati. He has an option remaining but figures to have a spot as a defensive backup when he returns. For now, Friedl will slot back in as the primary center fielder, with Myers acting as his backup. Matt McLain might also be an emergency option there, as manager Terry Francona told Goldsmith and others that it wouldn’t hurt for McLain to take some fly balls in center field.

PITTSBURGH — When Eugenio Suárez was up at the plate with two strikes and two outs in the top of the ninth inning with the Cincinnati Reds trailing the Pittsburgh Pirates by one run, the 13-year veteran said that he was able to lean on his experience.

“My experience lets me be not too excited in that situation,” Suárez said. “I calmed down my mind, thinking about just putting the ball in play, seeing something over the heart of the plate and putting a good swing on it.”

Statistically, he hasn’t been productive enough for the Reds in 2026. He entered Saturday with a .209 batting average, a .639 OPS and one of the worst strikeout rates in baseball. Suárez has some unique experiences that he can draw upon as he goes through a stretch like this.

He’s a two-time All-Star who knows what he’s capable of. And he also has gone through long slumps even worse than the one he has had in 2026. In a recent interview, he discussed the 2024 season, where he was terrible through the first half of the season and then was elite during the second half of the year.

Suárez had experienced all sorts of highs and lows.

“I put myself in the position to not think about the past,” he said. “This game is about one at-bat at a time.”

On Saturday, he delivered the most dramatic moment of this Reds season. Down to his last strike, Suaréz hit a two-out, three-run homer in the ninth inning that gave the Reds a 9-7 win as well as a series victory over the Pirates.

“Wow,” Terry Francona said. “Down to your last pitch. What a nice swing. On a day where there were a lot of ups and downs, it was nice to finish on an up.”

A lot has been going on with the Reds this weekend. They lost Tony Santillan to a significant oblique injury. Blake Dunn is heading back to Cincinnati for a closer look at his injured elbow. The Reds’ bullpen held on to a 6-4 win in the series opener in Pittsburgh. And Saturday was a back-and-forth game played in a steady rain.

Sal Stewart was the Reds’ hero early as he plated three runs. Chase Burns was the hero in the middle as he rebounded from allowing a three-run homer to strike out a season-high 10 batters. Jose Trevino was the hero in the sixth inning with a go-ahead two-run single.

There were also low moments from Burns, Sam Moll and Caleb Ferguson as the Pirates went on to take a 7-6 lead. The Reds’ best chance at a comeback looked like it would be with Stewart up and two runners on in the ninth inning, but he hit into a crushing double play.

After JJ Bleday kept the Reds alive with a walk, they had two runners on base and two outs in the ninth inning against Gregory Soto, a two-time All-Star. Suárez fell behind 0-1 on a pitch that he failed to challenge, and he ended up in a two-strike count. Entering Saturday, Suárez was 0-for-5 against Soto, who has one of the sharpest left-handed sinkers in baseball.

Soto bested Suárez for strike two with a low sinker that the Reds’ designated hitter whiffed at. With two strikes, Suárez was expecting the sinker again, and his mindset was to put the ball in play.

“I didn’t want to be the last out,” Suárez said. “I know how he has pitched me. The previous pitch, he got me with the same pitch. I was ready for that one. Put the ball in play, that’s all I thought in my mind. Be ready for something hard in my strike zone. Thank God I was able to put the ball in play and give us the lead.”

He hit a high, towering fly ball that made it over the towering right field fence at PNC Park. The three-run homer gave the Reds a 9-7 lead.

But even with the lead, the game was far from over for the Reds. The heart of the Pirates’ order was due up. And based on who was and wasn’t available in the Reds’ bullpen, Chase Petty was about to enter the game for the save opportunity.

Maybe this was the game where Petty went from “starting pitching prospect” to “rookie reliever.”

Petty overpowered the Pirates’ best hitters to close out the game and earn his first career save.

“I’m trusting my abilities and my repertoire and throwing strikes,” Petty said. “I’m attacking everyone I face, no matter who it is. I’m going to keep going after these guys. I’m having a great time.”

Petty was called back up to the big leagues a couple of weeks ago because the bullpen was absolutely taxed, Petty was on the 40-man roster and he was able to provide a long relief option.

Petty was trying to figure out where he fit in this bullpen. During his first few days in a relief role, Petty’s wife, Brooke, provided some words of encouragement.

“She said to be where my feet are and not worry about the past and not worry about the future,” Petty said. “There’s only one moment that matters. That’s now. Just make sure that I’m going one step at a time, one breath at a time and make sure I’m the best version of myself.”

He pitched well enough in some trial opportunities out of the bullpen to stick on the roster when the Reds got Pierce Johnson back from the IL. The bullpen is still thin on right-handed pitching, especially without Santillan, so pitchers like Petty have been pressed to pitch in prominent roles.

Recently, Francona spoke with Petty about this opportunity for him. No one is ruling out the potential for the 23-year-old Petty to go back to being a starting pitcher and have a long career down the road in the rotation. Right now, the need was in the bullpen. Francona told Petty that “He didn’t know exactly what’s going to happen. Keep being you and throwing strikes,” Petty said.

Petty is taking the opportunity and running with it so far out of the bullpen.

“He has been throwing the ball over the plate, he’s hard to run on and he’s showing really good composure and poise,” Francona said after Saturday’s win. “Good for him.”

PITTSBURGH — Even before Blake Dunn suffered an elbow injury that will require further evaluation back in Cincinnati, Terry Francona was looking at other options for the Cincinnati Reds in the leadoff spot. A few days ago, Francona spoke with De La Cruz about the possibility of him hitting at the top of the order.

“I talked to Elly about it the other day, just thinking about it,” Francona said. “It seemed like he was kind of excited about it. Nobody has a crystal ball. Maybe when we turn the lineup over, having him there, maybe that’ll help. That would be the hope.”

It seems like the Reds have landed on De La Cruz as the leadoff hitter by default. TJ Friedl, who could end up back in the big leagues if Dunn lands on the IL this week, and his struggles in the leadoff spot in April and May were one of the biggest negative surprises of the Reds’ season. After Friedl was one of the best leadoff hitters in MLB in 2025, his production dropped off so much in 2026 that he was optioned to Triple-A.

After Friedl lost the leadoff job in May, Francona gave a shot to Will Benson, Matt McLain, JJ Bleday and Dunn in that role. Dunn has been one of the success stories of the Reds’ season, and the former 15th-round pick has taken a meaningful step in the big leagues this season and produced at a league average level offensively.

But you’d like more than just league average production from the leadoff spot. Francona pointed out that Dunn only has seven RBI this year, and that was likely a factor in the discussions that were already taking place about going in a different direction in the leadoff spot before Dunn got hurt.

Unless Friedl or Will Benson (in Triple-A) has a huge resurgence, the Reds will enter the second half of the season without a true leadoff hitter on the roster.

About a month ago, Francona was asked why De La Cruz hadn’t been in the leadoff spot all along. Around baseball, you see stars like Shohei Ohtani, James Wood, Byron Buxton, Ketel Marte and Pete Crow-Armstrong getting regular starts at the top of the order.

“I have a feeling if you go and look at those lineups, they’re pretty lengthy,” Francona said in May. “There are reasons teams can do it. I get it. You want to get your best hitters more times to hit. I’m not sure we’re quite that length in our lineup.”

Here the Reds are, moving De La Cruz into the leadoff spot at a point in time where nearly the entire heart of the Reds’ order (JJ Bleday, Eugenio Suárez, Spencer Steer, as well as Sal Stewart and Nathaniel Lowe to a lesser degree) is cold.

The leadoff spot in the Reds’ lineup in 2026 is what the cleanup spot in their lineup was in 2025 (guys like Gavin Lux, Miguel Andujar, Tyler Stephenson, CES and Noelvi Marte all rotated through there). The 2025 Reds didn’t have a cleanup hitter, so the front office went out in free agency and prioritized adding a known slugger to the middle of their lineup. The Reds went over budget to sign Eugenio Suárez, who was coming off of a 49 homer season. Now, the Suárez move hasn’t worked out yet, and he’s having a very unproductive season.

However, the point remains that to fix the problem, the Reds went out and made an aggressive move.

The Reds will need to do something dramatic to find a leadoff hitter of the future.

It’ll be the same story in center field.

Dunn is a nice player, and he’s hitting .282. But his underlying metrics paint a more negative picture, and he looks like more of a long-term role player. He hasn’t proven yet that he’s on track to be the type of player that, for example, TJ Friedl was in 2023. The Reds’ entire plan is to build their roster with impact up the middle players, and it would be ideal to upgrade in center field in both the short term and the long term.

In the short term, Francona said that Dunn will head back to Cincinnati on Sunday to get his elbow further evaluated. Dunn felt his elbow grab at him on a throw on Friday, and Francona said that Dunn was also having a hard time swinging the bat after the injury took place.

If Dunn misses time, the Reds have a few short-term options in center field.

If Friedl or Benson ends up back on the roster for a Reds’ team that would need a center fielder without Dunn, they’d have a lot to prove after playing their way off of the big league roster through the first few months of the season.

Dane Myers started on Saturday against the Pirates in center field. But Francona has made the point in the past that starting Myers against lefties would be “backwards” because the Reds would lose their pinch-hit bat that they use against lefties late in games. Also, Myers has been more of a role player in his career.

Noelvi Marte has worked out in center field since spring training, he regularly played there in Triple-A this year and he has the tools to do it. But a recent game against the Mets showed that Marte still has too much work to do defensively to put him in center field every day right now. He’s just too inconsistent.

“I’m not sure that’s putting him in the best position,” Francona said on Saturday about Marte playing center field.

Bleday made 49 starts in center field for the Athletics in 2025 and 144 starts in center field in 2024, but Francona said that he’d like to keep Bleday in left.

Maybe Dunn’s injury leads to Matt McLain taking a few fly balls in center field and giving that position a shot.

The Reds’ most notable center field prospect is Carlos Jorge, who’s hitting .339 in Double-A.

The 22-year-old has an interesting story. Before this year, he had never really had much success in the minor leagues and wasn’t really on the prospect radar. Jorge’s development was stalling in High-A. Then, almost out of nowhere, Jorge looked like a different player in spring training. He made his impression as a replacement who closed out Cactus League games. It felt like he was doing something every game to provide a spark with his speed, defense or his offensive punch. He carried that momentum into the season in Double-A. It’s still a small sample size of success for Jorge in the minor leagues, but he’s a wiry athlete who can hit the ball hard.

He’s interesting, but he’s not a former first-round pick who the Reds have been paving a path to the big leagues for. Jorge would have a lot to prove to become the Reds’ center fielder of the future.

Just like center field is a short-term need, it’s also a long-term need for the Reds.

Unless Marte figures out the position, McLain moves to center field or Jorge has another leap in him, the Reds will have to make an aggressive move at some point to find a long-term center fielder.

That brings this conversation to the 2026 trade deadline.

If the Reds are in position to be buyers, a leadoff hitter and/or a center fielder would be the Reds’ biggest need. Some leadoff hitters who could be on the trade market include Tigers second baseman Gleyber Torres, Giants infielder Luis Arraez and Orioles corner outfielder Taylor Ward. Trading for any of these guys would be a short-term, win-now move.

Another approach the Reds could take as buyers would be targeting an under-the-radar center fielder to fill the current hole on the roster. Jo Adell (Angels), Mickey Moniak (Rockies) and Jake McCarthy (Rockies) all have multiple years of team control, have been productive offensively and are standout athletes. Lane Thomas could be a buy-low center fielder. A best-case scenario would be a trade with the Cardinals for Lars Nootbaar, who fits a lot of what the Reds should be looking for.

Nick Krall said on Friday that it’s too early to declare whether or not the Reds will be buyers or sellers at the deadline. The Reds have a 38-42 record and are in last place in the division entering Saturday’s game. If they continue to struggle, there’s the possibility that the Reds could deal some of their core players on expiring contracts.

If the Reds end up being sellers, then targeting a center field prospect with some upside would make a lot of sense. The Reds actually tried this in 2024 when they traded Frankie Montas for Joey Wiemer, whose athleticism and upside made him an interesting young piece at the time. (Wiemer ended up flopping, but the Reds did salvage the deal by using Wiemer as a part of the trade that brought Brady Singer to the Reds). The Reds could take a shot this year on a similar young center fielder, and hopefully they’d be able to get more out of him than they got out of Wiemer.

Good leadoff hitters are one of the hardest-to-find skill sets in baseball. So are good center fielders.

The Reds have work to do to find their answers in each of those roles.

PITTSBURGH — With de-facto closer Tony Santillan on the injured list with a significant oblique injury, the ninth inning on Friday at PNC Park looked so much different for the Cincinnati Reds’ bullpen.

Caleb Ferguson, who hadn’t recorded a save since 2024 and has six career saves, opened the ninth inning for the Reds. Ferguson was able to close out this game, but there was a scenario where Chase Petty would have entered the game out of the bullpen to record the final out.

Getting Emilio Pagán back from the injured list as soon as next Monday should bring some much-needed stability to the Reds’ bullpen. But for now, this is where they’re at.

Ferguson was the hero on Friday as he recorded the save against his former team.

“Losing Tony is never easy, especially with the way he has been able to carry for everybody,” Ferguson said after he recorded the save in a 6-4 win over the Pirates. “It’s next man up. It’s been next man up back there for like a month, it feels like.”

In retrospect, maybe the biggest strength of the 2025 Reds was the ability to give Santillan the ball in a high-leverage eighth inning all season, regardless of who was hitting for the other team, and to then give the ball to Pagán for the ninth inning all season. Also, for the bulk of the year, the Reds had Graham Ashcraft locking down the seventh inning.

That trio was the backbone of the Reds’ pitching staff in 2025. Ashcraft, Santillan and Pagán each also pitched a ton. This trio hasn’t been nearly as durable in 2026.

Pagán has missed two months with a Grade 2 hamstring injury (he’s on track to return as soon as Monday). Ashcraft is out for at least two months with an elbow strain. And on Friday, the Reds placed Santillan on the injured list with a significant oblique strain. Francona said there’s no timeline for Santillan to return and there’s not even a timeline yet for Santillan to get his oblique re-scanned.

It’s a huge loss for the Reds.

Santillan’s turnaround in June allowed him to settle in his role in the ninth inning over the last few weeks. And with Santillan effective in that role recently, roles finally started to settle in in the Reds’ bullpen.

Before then, roles had been extremely fluid going back to Pagán’s hamstring injury at the start of May. While the 2025 Reds had Ashcraft-Santillan-Pagán as the late-game trio in the seventh, eighth and ninth innings, the Reds were mixing and matching and counting on relievers to rise up and claim high-leverage roles. The bullpen was also very left-handed heavy, which presented some challenges.

In the middle of June, finally, Santillan’s resurgence gave the bullpen some much-needed consistency.

Last Monday, when Santillan was in the middle of a good stretch of closing games, Tejay Antone and Ferguson shared their thoughts about why the entire bullpen was starting to pitch better in the middle of June.

“It’s just nice to have an idea of what’s going on now,” Antone said on Monday. “That alleviates a lot of stress out there.”

Ferguson viewed the story of the season in a bullpen in a similar fashion.

“A bit of (the challenge) was trying to think along with Tito and trying to figure out how Tito was thinking after losing the pieces that he lost in the timeframe that he lost them,” Ferguson said on Monday.

Now without Santillan, late-game roles out of the bullpen are back to being more uncertain.

“I can’t tell them something that I don’t know,” Francona said before Friday’s game. “As things become more clear in my mind, I always try to tell them… I’m not trying to trick them. We’re on the same team. I’m just not sure. If you ask me about tonight, I’d have to ask (Pirates manager Don) Kelly if he was going to pinch-hit for his guys in the sixth. That changes who might pitch later.”

That’s exactly what happened on Friday night. The Pirates’ lineup construction for this specific game, and then the usage of pinch-hitters, shaped Francona’s plan.

Francona pulled starter Andrew Abbott after the third homer he allowed. Right-hander Tejay Antone, as consistent as any reliever on the team right now, entered the game with one out in the inning to face a slew of righties at the bottom of the Pirates’ lineup. Kelly made his first move in the sixth inning against Antone, putting in a righty with reverse splits in Nick Gonzales, who’s much better vs. RHP.

Antone did his job, getting three outs and getting into the seventh inning. Kelly subbed in another pinch-hitter against Antone, a switch-hitter in Endy Rodriguez who crushes RHP. Antone got through it and passed the baton to lefty Brock Burke, who entered the game to face a pocket of four hitters that included two standout left-handed hitters in Brandon Lowe and Ryan O’Hearn.

The bullpen plan had its pattern, and the unit was in full platoon mode. Burke made it through that pocket, and righty reliever Pierce Johnson entered the game to face two right-handed hitters and a switch hitter. Johnson got the final two outs of the eighth inning. Then, with Rodriguez (a switch hitter who’s much better versus righties) up to start the ninth inning, Francona brought in another lefty in Ferguson.

This is a lot of work to get from the seventh inning through the ninth. It’s much easier to just cover those innings with three guys like Ashcraft, Santillan and Pagán. That’s not the world the Reds live in right now. As a necessity, particularly until Pagán returns, Francona has to do things differently. On Friday, the plan worked against the Pirates.

“(The bullpen) did a good job,” Francona said. “We pieced it together.”

As much as Francona played the matchups on Friday, though, the game ended with a gut decision.

With a runner on base and two outs in the ninth, switch hitter Bryan Reynolds stepped up to the plate. Reynolds is fine vs. RHP, but he’s the ninth-best hitter in all of baseball (according to OPS) vs. LHP.

Francona could have brought in Petty. Instead, he stuck with Ferguson.

“I just thought with the experience and (Ferguson) being a veteran, let him face (Reynolds),” Francona said.

Ferguson forced a lineout to end the game.

“It’s just conviction,” Ferguson said. “I’ve faced a handful of those guys in the lineup a bunch. It’s moving the ball around and reminding myself of how hard it is to hit.”

PITTSBURGH — As you evaluate the 2026 Cincinnati Reds, the coaching staff and the front office as we approach the midpoint of the season, there are three important topics that you have to balance: Finances, transactions and development.

Payroll and the approach from Reds’ ownership is always going to be a factor in how the roster is built and the direction the Reds’ are taking.

The transactions made by the front office — both good (signing JJ Bleday and Nathaniel Lowe) and more questionable (the Ke’Bryan Hayes trade, or the Gavin Lux trade with the Dodgers) — are a part of the evaluation.

For a Reds’ team that hasn’t had a big payroll for most of its recent history, approach toward development is always going to be a critical piece of the puzzle as you determine the overall health of the Reds’ organization.

Ultimately, the Reds (37-42) haven’t been good enough through the first half of the season.

“We haven’t played up to our capability yet,” Nick Krall said on Friday. “We’ve had injuries. Everybody has injuries. We have some really good players on this team who can continue to take steps forward. We want to see those guys progressing. Some of it has been underperformance. In every aspect of our game, we need to continue to grow.”

A few player development topics have been especially notable watching the big league team this year.

The Reds have been the worst team in MLB against velocity (pitches 95 mph+), and that’s a skill that player development plays an important role in developing.

On the pitching side, the Reds’ young pitchers haven’t done a good enough job of throwing enough strikes, or of holding runners.

It’s an interesting time in Reds’ pitching development with pitching director Derek Johnson on a leave of absence. Organizational meetings last week in person in Cincinnati gave Reds’ brass a chance to look at and discuss how things are going. Without Johnson, Matt Tracy and Oscar Marin have stepped into bigger roles.

Krall said that Tracy and Marin have done a “very good job” with their added responsibilities over the last month.

Overall, Krall spoke positively about the state of Reds’ pitching development. The Reds statistically have been good at holding runners in the Minor Leagues. There are some good example of emerging under the radar pitchers in the farm system who have popped out of the blue, and the Reds have been one of the better teams in baseball at maximizing the value of their high pitching draft picks.

While the Reds would be in a much better spot this year if their rookie pitchers in 2026 (Connor Phillips, Luis Mey, Zach Maxwell, etc) had been more consistent in the big leagues, Krall sees the ship pointing in the right direction on the pitching side.

“We’ve got a lot of guys in the big leagues who have come through our system,” Krall said. “Do we need to get better? Of course we do. That’s a constant goal. Our guys overall have done a good job over the last few years. We’re just trying to make some tweaks and progress forward.”

On the hitting side, the Reds have an organizational philosophy that they’ve built around over the last six years.

“We need to continue to take good at-bats, be able to manipulate the bat, use the whole field and get on base,” Krall said. “Understanding what your zones are and what you can and can’t hit.”

There have been success stories like Sal Stewart, Blake Dunn and Bleday. There are also negative examples — Will Benson, Christian Encarnacion-Strand, Rece Hinds — of players who couldn’t stick in the big leagues and uncertainties around players like Noelvi Marte and Matt McLain whose roles going forward aren’t set in stone.

“I don’t think development is linear,” Krall said. “Dunn has progressed in his role at the big league level. Sometimes, you think a guy will get to the big leagues and he’ll do exactly what he did in the minor leagues. Sometimes, you’ve got to figure out how to make those adjustments. We need to make sure we’re doing the best we can to help these kids grow at this level so they can be productive big leaguers.”

Maybe the oddest thing about the Reds right now is how little about their future is set in stone, specifically on the position player side.

Elly De La Cruz, Sal Stewart and Spencer Steer will be every day players on the team next year.

After that?

There are things to like about Bleday, Dunn, Marte, McLain, Edwin Arroyo, Dane Myers and others. But each of those players still has things to prove.

So do the Reds, who have the fourth-worst record in the National League.

“We just have to put it all together at the same time,” said Krall, who’s frustrated by the team’s record in division play this year.

Krall said that “it’s too early” to determine what the Reds’ approach at the trade deadline is going to be.

A full rebuild seems unlikely. Bleday, Steer, Nick Lodolo and Andrew Abbott would get the Reds more in return than their players on expiring contracts, but the Reds historically haven’t punted on seasons (even in 2022, when they held onto guys like Kyle Farmer and Donovan Solano at the deadline).

In 2024, the Reds didn’t entertain offers for Jonathan India and went on to deal two pitchers on expiring contracts in Frankie Montas and Lucas Sims. If the Reds don’t turn things around, the approach at the 2024 deadline looks like a relevant comparison.

The 2026 Reds have Eugenio Suárez, Brady Singer, Tyler Stephenson, Pierce Johnson, Caleb Ferguson, Brock Burke and Nathaniel Lowe, among others, on expiring contracts. The Reds, in theory, could “tear it down” by trading all of those guys for as many prospects as they can. But the 2024 example shows that the Reds typically haven’t gone in that direction.

Krall said that he’s very optimistic about the rotation, especially with Hunter Greene nearing a return (as soon as July 3). That’s one area of the team that gives Krall confidence, and the lineup also has Elly De La Cruz back off the IL. If the Reds start winning more games, then that better sets up a scenario where the Reds are more aggressive.

“If there’s something that can make your team better, you have to figure out what that is and how to do it for the short term and the long term,” Krall said.

Two more points about the scenario where the Reds would be buyers at the deadline

-Krall said that he hasn’t had conversations yet with ownership about the financial flexibility he’d have available to spend at the deadline.

-Krall brought up how the Reds unexpectedly traded for Zach Littell at the deadline last year (bullpen prices were really high on the trade market, so the Reds added a starter and moved Nick Martinez to the bullpen). Last year’s trade market shaped the process that ended up with the Reds landing Littell. This year’s trade market and the external factors in it would shape different paths the Reds could go down.

2:20pm: Santillan’s full timeline still isn’t clear but manager Terry Francona tells Charlie Goldsmith of Charlie’s Chalkboard that the strain is significant.

12:42pm: The Reds announced today that right-hander Zach McCambley has been recalled from Triple-A Louisville. He’ll take the roster spot of righty Tony Santillan, who has been placed on the 15-day injured list with a left oblique strain, retroactive to June 23rd. It’s unclear how much time the Reds expect Santillan to miss.

Santillan, 29, has been a key part of the Cincinnati bullpen for a while. Over the 2024 and 2025 seasons, he made 109 appearances, allowing 2.60 earned runs per nine. He walked 9% of batters faced while striking out opponents at a 28.6% clip. He earned seven saves and 37 holds.

His results haven’t been as strong this year, as he has a 5.23 ERA through 31 innings. His strikeout rate has dropped all the way down to 20.9% while his walk rate has ticked up slightly to 10.4%. Despite the diminished results, it’s a blow for the Reds. They lost both Emilio Pagán and Graham Ashcraft to the IL last month, depriving them of their closer and one of their top setup arms.

Those injuries pushed Santillan into a more prominent position in the relief corps. He recorded saves in three straight appearances from June 13th to 21st. Now the Reds are losing yet another arm from their late-game mix. That will mean that guys like Brock Burke, Pierce Johnson, Sam Moll and Tejay Antone will have to handle the leverage work for the time being.

Ashcraft isn’t going to be back soon. The Reds placed him directly onto the 6o-day IL at the end of May with a UCL sprain. Pagán shouldn’t be too far off though. A hamstring strain put him on the 15-day IL in early May. He was sent to Triple-A Louisville for a rehab assignment yesterday and was going to start last night’s contest but it was rained out. Once Mother Nature allows him to get a few appearances in, he should be good to rejoin the big league club. He had a 6.43 ERA before hitting the IL and will obviously be looking to get that number down.

The Reds have been cold lately and have fallen to 37-42, which puts them 5.5 games out of a playoff spot. The trade deadline is a little over a month away, so they will need to gain some ground in over to avoid a summer selloff. Doing that with a banged-up bullpen is going to be a challenge.

Photo courtesy of Sam Greene, Imagn Images

After Cincinnati Reds relief pitcher Julian Garcia made his big league debut on Tuesday, Terry Francona linked up with him in the dugout.

“Take a minute and remember where you were and where you are,” Francona told him.

Garcia, 31 years old, had just become the second-oldest Reds pitcher in the expansion era (since 1961) to make his big league debut. Garcia pitched 1 ⅔ shutout innings with three strikeouts, and the debut included a shut down trip through the heart of the Milwaukee Brewers’ lineup.

Garcia wasn’t supposed to make it here. He has had to earn every single opportunity he has received.

He started pitching as a senior in high school, growing up in Denver. Garcia had potential, but he wasn’t getting any college offers. He impressed the coaching staff of Metro State, a Division II school in Denver, at a showcase and got the chance to pitch at that school for two years. At Metro State, he did well enough in college that the Phillies drafted him in the 10th round of the 2016 MLB Draft.

Garcia found himself on a ridiculously loaded short-season Rookie Ball team in the Phillies’ organization that had six other starting pitchers who have gone on to pitch in the big leagues.

“I was behind the eight ball with all of that stuff,” Garcia said. “I was trying to figure out how to be a pitcher in professional baseball with guys who are seen at prospects, guys who got big money bonuses. I’m a kid from Denver trying to just figure it out.”

Garcia was solid at that level in 2016. Heading into 2017, Garcia expected that he’d get the chance to pitch in A-ball. He was disappointed to begin that year back in the short-season Rookie Ball league, but the Phillies told Garcia that he’d be the first pitcher called up to A-ball when they had a need.

“It didn’t happen,” Garcia said. “I stayed a whole nother year at short season.”

He got the chance to pitch in Low-A in 2018. The manager of that team, Marty Malloy, really believed in Garcia and talked him up in conversations with Phillies’ brass. That put Garcia more on the map in the organization, and he went on to become a prospect in the organization.

Garcia stayed on an upward trajectory through the offseason leading into 2021, and he earned an invite to big league camp with the Phillies that year. He opened the year in Double-A and was then promoted to Triple-A.

“That’s where I struggled,” Garcia said.

In 14 games with Triple-A Lehigh Valley in 2021, Garcia posted an 8.07 ERA.

“I knew I could pitch,” Garcia said. “It was about getting the mentality for it and learning how to deal with failure. “I’d go home and call my dad and be like, ‘I’ve lost all confidence. I don’t have any confidence.’”

After ending the 2021 season on a downward note, Garcia opened the 2022 season back in Double-A. The Phillies’ organization signed a bunch of minor league free agents to pitch in Triple-A that year, which created a roster crunch in the upper levels of the minor league system.

Garcia ended up pitching just about once per week out of the bullpen in Double-A in 2022.

On June 25, 2022, it was Garcia’s day to pitch a couple of innings out of the bullpen. In the bullpen, he injured his ankle. He kept that to himself.

“I knew I needed to pitch because I was only pitching once a week,” Garcia said. “I needed a chance to pitch and show that I could do it.”

Garcia had a good first inning out of the bullpen, but his ankle really swelled up as he sat in the dugout. He was asked to go out for another inning, and the adrenaline wore off. He had a bad night.

“I went back to the hotel thinking that’s probably it,” Garcia said. “Let’s see what happens.”

The Phillies’ organization put the 27-year-old Garcia on the minor league IL, and he rehabbed the injury for a couple of weeks.

“They never activated me,” Garcia said.

In the middle of July, he asked his Double-A manager and pitching coach if he needed to ask for his release. Garcia felt like the “writing was on the wall.”

Thirty minutes later, he was informed that the Phillies were cutting him. He was officially released on July 13, 2022.

“I went home that night and thought I’d get calls (from other teams),” Garcia said. “I had good stuff. We’ll see what happens. Nothing ever came other than Indy Ball contract offers.”

Garcia had heard “horror stories” about Indy Ball, so he wanted to at least give training on his own a shot before he went to that level. Also, he needed what he calls “a mental reset.”

“I needed to decompress and get my mental side back to normal,” Garcia said. “In 2021 and 2022, I had a miserable time in baseball. I didn’t love the game. I was always finding myself complaining. Anything that was wrong, I’d complain about it. I was in a bad state of mind. It wasn’t fun.”

Heading into the 2023 season, Garcia still only had Indy Ball offers on the table. He didn’t feel ready for that yet.

Back home in Denver, he taught baseball lessons to kids.

“That was getting me back into loving the game,” Garcia said. “That helped me see the game for what it is with the young kids and their smiles coming in just to play.”

He was also throwing live bullpen sessions against high school and college hitters every week. That gave him film and data to send to teams.

He just had to get their attention.

Garcia started effectively sending his resume to whoever he could find in baseball. He shared video and information about his repertoire to scouts, coaches and executives that he could get in touch with.

He sent cold direct messages on Twitter and Instagram. He networked via Linkedin. He’d even get lists of names of scouts, research what the company email formula is for specific teams (something like [email protected]) and get information out that way.

He sent over 100 messages in 2023 and only got a handful of responses.

One of them really stood out.

Garcia sent video one day to someone with the Mets, and he got a phone call about 30 minutes later. Garcia was told the organization liked his stuff, and they talked for 30 minutes about a possible fit for Garcia in the Mets’ organization.

The conversation went great. Garcia thought a contract would get done. He waited and didn’t hear back. He was told to “wait until the trade deadline. Wait until this. Wait until that. I was just waiting around.”

The spot never opened.

“The Mets thing I really thought was going to happen,” Garcia said.

It didn’t. But there was a silver lining that Garcia took away from his discussions with the Mets.

“That was a confidence boost,” Garcia said. “Finally, someone answered and gave me a chance to talk. That’s something that kept me going.”

Heading into 2024, he felt ready for Indy Ball. Garcia did a lot of research before he signed with the Kansas City Monarchs. He particularly heard good things about Monarchs manager Joe Calfapietra and the pitching success stories that he had been a part of.

Garcia also had a friend on the team, reliever Zack Leban, who helped link Garcia with the Monarchs and helped get him signed in Kansas City.

Garcia pitched well in Kansas City. He was confident in the improvements that he was making. Heading into 2025, Garcia received an offer to pitch in a professional league in Mexico. Garcia stuck with the Monarchs because of his confidence that Calfapietra could help him link up with an MLB organization.

“Joe told me that he’d get me out no matter what,” Garcia said. “Every day, he didn’t stop sending out data reports, talking to people and getting the word around.”

Calfapietra would get feedback from teams about how Garcia was already 30 years old, and how he didn’t throw that hard.

Calfapietra would tell them, “He spins the ball! He throws strikes!”

“He was flat out trying to get me out of there,” Garcia said. “He’s the reason why I got a chance with the Reds.”

Calfapietra had connections with the Reds. Baseball is a small world. Calfapietra actually coached Fernando Cruz in Indy Ball when Cruz was the journeyman pitcher just trying to get on the radar.

Last August, the Reds’ minor league pitching depth was getting thinner. The organization needed a starting pitcher to help get the Chattanooga Lookouts through the season. Garcia signed with the Reds’ organization on Aug. 26, 2025, and made three starts down the stretch for the Lookouts.

“I literally just went into it like I’d get my opportunity, see what happens and make the best of it,” Garcia said. “I was the oldest guy there.”

Tejay Antone was also on that Lookouts team during the final month of the 2025 season. Antone was impressed with Garcia.

“I love Julian,” Antone said. “Coming out of Indy Ball and getting to the big leagues is an incredible story. He’s a grinder. He has a quiet confidence. He works hard. Everything you could ask for in a guy.

The Reds liked Garcia enough to call him the day after the 2025 season ended and offered him a minor league contract for 2026.

“They believed in me,” Garcia said. “I just wanted to feel wanted for once in my career. There were so many up and down battles. I just wanted to feel wanted after sending out all of those messages. I wanted somebody to say that they wanted to sign me. The Reds called so early. Let’s lock this down.”

While the Reds liked him, he still wasn’t very high on the organizational depth chart entering spring training. He didn’t get an invite to big league camp. Instead, he was the pitcher ready to back up any Reds’ pitcher in Cactus League games who couldn’t get out of the inning. Garcia was the “extra arm” who the Reds had sitting in the bullpen for spring training games in case he was needed.

It’s a very unglamorous job. Pitchers often prefer just getting to pitch in minor league spring training games because they know they’re going to get in. Sometimes in spring training, Garcia would just spend the afternoon in the bullpen and not even warm up.

There was a silver lining to it. The nature of that spring training job required him to be ready to pitch at any given moment. He had to be ready to pitch in the first inning if the starter’s pitch count got too high in that inning. And he had to be ready for “save” opportunities in the ninth inning.

Garcia was just excited to get the chance to pick up the ball, compete and show what he was capable of. He put himself on the map in the Reds’ organization with how he looked in a couple of those games.

At the end of spring, Garcia was invited to take a trip with the Reds to Milwaukee. The Reds were playing two scrimmages against the Brewers and needed a minor league long reliever who’d be ready to pitch if anyone got hurt or had a short outing.

Garcia didn’t even enter any of those games. But the chance to travel with the team and be in a big league game meant something to him, even if it was just a scrimmage.

At the end of the scrimmage series in Milwaukee, Garcia ran into assistant pitching coach Matt Tracy.

Garcia remembers Tracy saying, “Hey man, keep doing your thing and enjoy it.”

“It was a vote of confidence,” Garcia said. He knew that he had turned some heads.

He still had a lot of work to do to get to the big leagues. As well as he had pitched in spring, the Reds believed that they were entering the season with very strong bullpen depth in Triple-A. Just about all of Louisville’s other pitchers were in big league spring training with the Reds, and most of them had some experience in the big leagues. Garcia was behind the eight ball again. Then, early in the year, he spent 11 days on the IL with a minor hip injury.

Garcia really started to hit his stride in May. On May 13, I went to Triple-A to watch Edwin Arroyo and Noelvi Marte. Garcia entered the game out of the bullpen and struck out five in two shutout innings. The slider was really impressive. I asked around after that game, “Who is this guy?”

Garcia started entering the discussion as a potential call up. He was making a terrific impression in Triple-A.

“He’s an amazing person,” Chase Petty said. “His story to get here, all of his time in the Minor Leagues, for it to pay off to get here, he’s so dedicated to his craft. Even in his catch play, you see it with every throw. You’d never guess that he had his journey because he’s so positive and caring for his teammates.”

In late May, a reeling Reds’ bullpen gave chances to Lyon Richardson, Yunior Marte and Brandon Leibrandt before Garcia received his chance. Garcia had to wait his turn. Again.

“I didn’t know how much they valued me,” Garcia said. “In my head, I knew I was a big leaguer. I was throwing well. I knew I had the stuff. The swings and misses were big. I was just trying to build on every outing and see what happens, living day by day.”

Eventually, he reached the point where he was pitching so well that he couldn’t be denied a call-up to the big leagues. In Triple-A in June, he posted a 1.29 ERA across 14 innings. On Monday, he replaced long reliever Chris Paddack on the Reds’ active roster.

Garcia’s call-up to the big leagues was the culmination of a decade-long journey.

He also hopes that he’s just getting started.

“Sometimes, you just need an opportunity,” Garcia said. “Sometimes, it takes one little tweak that can accelerate your career. There are only so many opportunities in baseball. But whatever you do with it, the sky is the limit.”

Veteran righty Chris Paddack elected free agency after being outrighted by the Reds, according to the MLB.com transaction tracker. Cincinnati designated him for assignment on Monday.

This is the second time Paddack has gotten through waivers this year. The first came after he was released by the Marlins in mid-May, an uncommonly quick turnaround for a major league free agent pickup from the previous offseason. It was an inevitability that he’d clear waivers that time, as a claiming team would otherwise have taken his $4MM salary off Miami’s books.

The Reds waited until he cleared, then signed him to a major league contract at the league minimum. Paddack took the ball six times for Cincinnati, starting three appearances before moving to the bullpen. He posted a 6.04 ERA through 22 1/3 innings. That was a little better than his early-season performance with Miami, as he’d given up nearly eight earned runs per nine innings for the Fish.

Paddack has a combined 6.96 ERA over 53 frames on the season. He’s still throwing strikes but has a modest 15.7% strikeout percentage and gave up too many home runs in Miami. It has been the same general profile for a few seasons. Paddack had an excellent rookie season with the Padres in 2019 but hasn’t been the same since battling injuries (most notably Tommy John surgery) in the intervening few years. He still has a quality changeup, but opponents have pummeled his fastball and he has never had great breaking stuff.

Any team could have claimed Paddack for the league minimum this time around. The Marlins are on the hook for the remainder of the salary either way because he already cleared release waivers after the first DFA. It seems no one was willing to plug Paddack directly onto the MLB roster. He may be limited to a minor league deal in this trip to the market.

When Cincinnati Reds starting pitcher Hunter Greene underwent a procedure on his right elbow in March, the expected timeline for him to be back on the mound in the big leagues was some point in July.

Now, he expects to be back from the injured list on July 3. He’s set up to make it back from this injury around one-to-two weeks ahead of schedule.

“I worked my (tail) off,” Greene said. “I wanted to continue to uphold the promise that I had when I signed my extension here (in 2023). Obviously, I’ve missed time. I can’t control that. All I can control is being able to put my best foot forward and being as competitive and as dominant as possible to try to make that up the best I can.”

In March, Greene had a procedure done to remove bone chips in his right arm. Those chips were previously creating a “stabbing” pain on every throw. Now, those chips are gone, and the injury is behind him. Greene is healthy and he’s eager to return to the big leagues.

Assuming all goes well in his final rehab outing, the final step is expected to be a rehab start on Sunday in Triple-A where Greene will throw 80-to-85 pitches. If all goes according to plan, he’d then pitch next Friday (July 3) against the Orioles.

Between July 3 and the end of the season, he’d be able to make around 15 starts.

“It’s a great opportunity,” Greene said. “I’ve got to be ready to go. I will be. There are a lot of factors. I can only control so much with my performance. I’ve been able to check the boxes I need to to make sure I’m at my best. Last year, I came in and dominated pretty much the whole entire stretch in the second half. That’s my intention here again. I want to go deep into games.”

Expectations should be high for the 26-year-old.

In 2024, he was in the Cy Young conversation before an elbow issue sidelined him late in the year. In 2025, he posted a 2.76 ERA in 19 starts. When the Reds made their push to the postseason in September, Greene had performances where he allowed one run in 6 ⅓ innings, one run in seven innings, a complete game shutout and a six-inning, two-run performance (he then struggled in the playoffs in his start against the Dodgers).

Greene is one of the most talented pitchers in baseball, and he hopes to provide a boost to the team and to the Reds’ pitching staff.

“I’m going to be the most fresh guy,” Greene said. “I’m going to try to cover as many innings as I can and be as efficient as possible.”

As he ramps up toward his return, Greene has been working on his game.

A big project for him in spring training, before he was sidelined, was going to be the addition of a two-seam fastball. Greene has picked that back up, and he has been using that pitch and getting results with it. It’ll be the first time that he has had a secondary fastball that complements his four-seam.

He said that a benefit of working at the Reds’ spring training complex in Arizona all spring was the opportunity to use the ABS technology that the Reds have set up in Goodyear. He spent a lot of time getting a feel for the new challenge system.

Using the two-seam and being ready for the ABS challenge system are two areas of his game that he has been able to develop.

“It’s being able to find different edges you can use to your advantage,” Greene said. “I remember asking Joey Votto in my first or second year in the show. I asked him how was he able to do this for 17 years. It was a general question, but I knew he was going to give an in-depth answer. It was along the lines of he had to find a way every offseason to find a new edge and make adjustments.”

The Cincinnati Reds would have had a better shot to beat the Milwaukee Brewers on Tuesday if Matt McLain were playing second base, Spencer Steer were in right field and Will Benson were on the bench.

Instead, McLain and Steer were on the bench, and Benson was on his way to Triple-A.

In McLain’s place at second base was Edwin Arroyo. While this play technically didn’t end up being charged an error on Arroyo and was ruled catcher’s interference, he threw the ball from second base to the first base dugout for the second time in three games. In the fourth inning, a potential double play ball got by Arroyo.

While Nick Lodolo escaped the jam, the mistake racked up his pitch count on a day where Lodolo got banged up with a wrist contusion.

Holding runners when the Reds are on defense has been a big issue for the team recently, and adding to that problem is the fact that Arroyo has failed to catch the ball three times over his last two starts at second base.

Arroyo, a defense-first prospect, hasn’t been a consistent defender in the big leagues at second base, which is a position that he only played 32 times in the Minor Leagues.

“He’s just got to remember to move his feet,” Terry Francona said. “When he moves his feet, his arm angle gets back up where it needs to be.”

In a 2-0 win for the Brewers on Tuesday, Milwaukee scored one of its runs when a ball rolling down the right field wall got by Noelvi Marte in right field. After Marte failed to pick it up, Andrew Vaughn (who ranks in the 13th percentile in average sprint speed) scored from first.

“I know it went around the bend and Noelvi didn’t get it,” Francona said. “It’s really hard for me to see that from where I’m sitting. I think if he comes up with that cleanly, they don’t score there.”

Offensively, Arroyo and Marte combined to go 0-for-6.

Why Arroyo and Marte were in the lineup raises some questions about what the Reds’ plans are right now.

On Tuesday, the Reds activated Elly De La Cruz from the injured list and optioned Will Benson to Triple-A. Benson could have helped the Reds on Tuesday. In the ninth inning, down by two runs against All-Star Brewers closer Trevor Megill, Jose Trevino and Arroyo took at-bats. Benson would have been a better option with his ability to draw a walk or hit one over the fence (he has a 1.284 OPS in 16 pinch-hit plate appearances this year).

By optioning Benson, the Reds took away some of their flexibility on the bench. The construction of the Reds’ bench right now doesn’t look optimal.

They also created a logjam. The roster has redundant pieces.

Right now, it looks like there are three spots in the lineup for five players: Steer (he should play just about every day but has received more off days during a June slump) McLain, Arroyo, Marte and leadoff hitter Blake Dunn. Before Tuesday’s game, Francona was asked about the plan at second base, where McLain, Arroyo and Steer are all options.

“I don’t know,” Francona said. “That’s just being truthful. We talked extensively for a while knowing Elly was coming back. Arroyo can move around, as we’ve seen. Just because we did this today doesn’t mean we need to stay like this. We’ll see how this works out.”

When De La Cruz was on the IL for three weeks, Francona mixed and matched. Steer started 17 of the 19 games while getting some off days as he had a very unproductive month at the plate, McLain started 17 of the 19 games, Arroyo made 14 starts in 19 games, Marte was called up on June 5 (replacing TJ Friedl) and made 12 starts in a 15-game stretch and Dunn played 16 of the 19 games.

De La Cruz’s return takes a regular every day spot in the lineup at shortstop.

With the All-Star shortstop back, McLain could be the Reds’ starting second baseman. Arroyo could be. Steer could play there to open up right field for Marte. They could give Marte another shot in center and give him starts over Dunn there with Steer in right and Arroyo or McLain at second.

What do the Reds want to be? A pitching and defense team that sticks with its veterans — which Francona typically does, saying that guys get as hot as they do cold — or a development team?

Arroyo and Marte already weren’t playing every single day before De La Cruz was active, and now there’s one fewer spot in the lineup.

Francona said about Arroyo on Tuesday, “We don’t want this kid just sitting. We’ll see how it works.”

Marte fits into the same boat as a young guy with talent who needs reps and needs to be a more consistent player.

How will Francona go about divvying playing time between this group of guys who already weren’t every day players?

“I try to look ahead as much as I can to see what fits, what doesn’t fit or when would be a good day,” Francona said. “We don’t want these guys to sit the bench. That’s not developing.”

While Benson was barely playing, he still had a role on the team as a left-handed pinch-hit bat and as a backup center fielder.

On Tuesday, Francona didn’t use his bench. McLain and Steer didn’t enter the game. McLain, Arroyo and Dunn aren’t really pinch-hitter types, and Marte is 1-for-9 in his career as a pinch-hitter.

Rotating these guys in and out of the lineup on a day-to-day basis is far from ideal.

As Francona said, “Just because we did this today doesn’t mean we need to stay like this. We’ll see how this works out.”

Unless the Reds want to go into more of a developmental emphasis with the way they build their lineup, McLain should play at second base over Arroyo. McLain’s struggles have been well-documented, but his OPS on the season (.656) and in June (.807) is better than what Arroyo has done over his first three weeks in the big leagues (.552 OPS) — McLain is having another bad week with a .111 average over his last seven games after a good start to the month of June.

Arroyo is picking up singles down the line, but he’s not hitting for power or drawing walks. Also, McLain is the better defender and base runner. He gives the Reds a better shot to win now.

Marte has a .815 OPS in June, he has been able to cut down his chase rate across the board for every pitch type and his power production feels like a very good sign. His defense hasn’t been good enough yet. Being able to play center field would help, but he had a bad defensive game there last week.

Chasing Marte’s offensive ceiling by playing him on a semi regular basis may be a bet the Reds need to take as the offense could use another hitter with the skill set to catch up to a high-velocity fastball. Marte should mix in along with Steer, Dunn and maybe even a slumping Eugenio Suárez at DH.

One more question to consider as Francona plots out the lineup is whether or not De La Cruz will need off days as he returns from a hamstring injury.

“I don’t know,” Francona said. “If you know, tell me. There’s no crystal ball. If he doesn’t get any hits, he’s probably going to play every day because he’s not on base running and diving. I hope he is. We’ll keep an eye on him.”

Who plays and how much among the group of hitters competing for regular spots in the lineup will show a lot about the Reds. Historically, we’ve seen Francona go all-in on the veterans who entered the season as starters (the position that Steer and McLain are in right now). Playing Arroyo and Marte more would be a big shift toward development.

One more thing about the Reds’ offense

The biggest weakness of the offense right now is how much it’s struggling against fastball velocity. That was the case again on Tuesday as Brandon Sproat carried a no-hitter into the sixth inning and as the Reds got shut out again.

The Reds have the worst OPS (.596) in all of MLB against pitches 95 mph+.

Against pitches above 98 mph, the Reds have a .491 OPS (the fourth-worst in MLB).

“It’s something that starts in the minor leagues, making it a priority,” hitting coach Chris Valaika said. “Spin is up in the Major Leagues. You see stuff getting better and better and velocity getting bigger and bigger. It’s something we talk about. It’s something we’re stressing. We have to be accountable for it, take it in stride and continue to get better. It has been a weakness of ours. Teams are going to exploit that until we flip the narrative.”

When asked about the trend, Francona stressed the importance of the drills that Reds’ hitters do against velocity machines before games.

Valaika also emphasized the importance of the hitter’s “mentality.”

“You have to be ready that you’re not going to get beat on a fastball,” Valaika said. “It’s ok to look silly swinging through a breaking ball, but you’re not going to get beat consistently on fastballs. We do have to do some searching on that.”

It’s three years to the day since Elly De La Cruz hit for the cycle and the Reds extended their winning streak to 12 games. In the lineup that night were TJ Friedl, Jonathan India, Jake Fraley, Joey Votto and Luke Maile.

Tonight, as Elly De La Cruz returns from the injured list, the Reds’ lineup could include Blake Dunn, JJ Bleday, Sal Stewart, Nathaniel Lowe, Eugenio Suárez, Noelvi Marte and Edwin Arroyo.

The Reds’ roster has turned over so, so quickly, even just compared to where it was at the start of last season. At the start of 2025, Friedl, Matt McLain, Gavin Lux (under contract for two more years after a big trade), Jeimer Candelario (under contract for two more seasons on a big contract), Christian Encarnacion-Strand and Jake Fraley were supposed to be core parts of the team.

While Will Benson wasn’t in the lineup for De La Cruz’s cycle game or on the Opening Day roster in 2025, there were still plenty of times over the last few years where he looked like a big part of what the Reds were trying to build. On Tuesday, the Reds optioned Benson back to Triple-A.

Outside of De La Cruz, Tyler Stephenson (a free agent at the end of the year), Matt McLain (who has been splitting with Arroyo at second base) and Spencer Steer (playing a new position to him, right field, due to how many changes there have been), this all of a sudden looks like an entirely different Reds’ lineup.

Dunn went from bouncing between Triple-A to the leadoff spot in the big leagues this year. Bleday went from Triple-A to the heart of the order this year, and Nathaniel Lowe went from minor league free agent to the cleanup spot. Stewart is a standout rookie in an important role. Arroyo and Marte are still very young, but they’ve been getting a chance to compete for bigger roles. And Suárez was a marquee free agent signing in 2026 (one that hasn’t worked out yet).

What happened to the old core?

At the start of the 2024 season, Friedl and Benson looked like the core of the Reds’ outfield going forward. They were still in the early stages of their careers, and they each delivered some incredible highs in 2023 (each of their first opportunities to get regular playing time in a full big league season).

Friedl’s defensive decline took place over time, and it wasn’t a surprise that he had to play more left field than center field this year. The shock was how he stopped getting on base in the big leagues. In one offseason, he went from one of the very best leadoff men in MLB to Triple-A.

Benson was so good in 2023 that he hit second in the Reds’ 2024 Opening Day lineup. He looked like an athletic slugger with elite strike zone judgement. He went on to have a terrible 2024 season. In 2025, while he had some nice moments and streaks when he received opportunities in the big leagues, he didn’t get many. In 2026, Benson didn’t perform well enough to earn a corner outfield job that was completely up for grabs until JJ Bleday emerged in May.

The Reds traded two standout prospects for Lux in 2025 but then flipped him before the 2026 season for middle reliever Brock Burke.

Similar to Benson, Fraley looked like an emerging middle of the order threat at one point. He was ok in 2025. But then after the trade deadline, when the Reds got healthy and also added two regular position players (Miguel Andujar and Ke’Bryan Hayes) into the mix, Fraley was squeezed out of a role and got DFAd.

Encarnacion-Strand could never swing at enough strikes to hold onto a regular starting spot.

Candelario was a bust.

India (traded for Brady Singer) and Lux were the only one of these players not in the organization anymore who the Reds got impact value for on the way out. Friedl and Benson are now in Triple-A.

As much as the Reds valued this old core and as exciting as the flashes were for Friedl, Benson, Fraley and Encarnacion-Strand, that 2023-2025 group never won a playoff game and now has core pieces of that group being phased out. You can make the case that the Reds held on to Friedl, Benson, Fraley, Encarnacion-Strand and others for too long for both their own sake (guys like Benson and CES didn’t get to play a ton) and the Reds’.

Going forward, heading into the future, should the Reds be more proactive — just like the Brewers are — in trading key players for big returns even when the moves are immediately unpopular with the fanbase? That approach led to the Brewers trading some of their most popular players (Corbin Burnes, Freddy Peralta, Devin Williams), but landing new young contributors like Kyle Harrison, David Hamilton, Joey Ortiz, Brandon Sproat, Robert Gasser and DL Hall (as well as prospects like Jett Williams).

The Reds’ 2026 lineup is almost unrecognizable compared to previous versions of this team. They’re in a spot now where they’re depending on guys like Dunn, Marte and Arroyo to be good right away.

The good news on Tuesday is that Elly De La Cruz is back from the IL. The lineup feels completely different with him in the mix.

But the other side of that transaction — optioning Benson — was another reminder of just now much this roster has changed.

Reds shortstop Elly De La Cruz has been activated from the 10-day injured list after missing 19 games with a strained right hamstring.

De La Cruz who has been sidelined since June 1 took batting practice prior to Monday night's series opener against the first-place Brewers.

He made three rehab starts for Triple-A Louisville, going 2 for 8 with a home run and two RBIs. After homering in his first rehab start on Friday, De La Cruz texted Francona, Be there tomorrow," but the Reds didn't want to rush things.

De La Cruz left the May 31 game against the Atlanta Braves with right hamstring tightness after he had a base hit in the fifth inning.

He had a streak of appearing in 276 consecutive games snapped, the sixth-longest streak for a Reds player in the expansion era (since 1961). His streak began on July 30, 2024.

Before going on the injured list, De La Cruz was batting .280 with 12 home runs.

Cincinnati (37-39) took two of three from the Yankees in New York over the weekend but remain in last place in the NL Central.

Outfielder Will Benson has been optioned to Triple-A Louisville, where Hunter Greene has also been transferred as he continues his rehab assignment.

The Reds announced that right-hander Pierce Johnson has been reinstated from the 15-day injured list and that righty Julian Garcia has been selected to the roster. The Garcia move was reported yesterday. To open space for those two, they have optioned righty Zach Maxwell and designated righty Chris Paddack for assignment.

Cincinnati picked up Paddack in May after he had been released by the Marlins. At the time, the Reds had Hunter Greene, Brandon Williamson and Rhett Lowder on the injured list. Paddack made a few starts until Lowder came off the IL, which bumped him into a long relief role.

In total, Paddack made six appearances as a Red, three starts and three out of the bullpen. He logged 22 1/3 innings, allowing 6.04 earned runs per nine. That’s a tiny sample of work but it continues a trend of Paddack not being terribly effective at getting big league hitters out. He was injured for most of 2022 and 2023. Since the start of the 2024 season, he has a 5.53 ERA in 299 1/3 innings. His 5.9% walk rate in that time is quite good but his 17.7% strikeout rate and 37.3% ground ball rate have both been subpar.

Even before the injury odyssey, his effectiveness was starting to wane. He had an excellent rookie season in 2019, posting a 3.33 ERA that year, but was closer to 5.00 in each of the two following seasons. Dating back to the start of 2020, he has logged 494 big league innings with a 5.27 ERA.

Despite the track record, the Marlins took a shot on him this offseason by giving him a $4MM deal. That didn’t pan out, as Paddack posted a 7.63 ERA over seven appearances before getting bumped from the roster. The Marlins remain on the hook for the remainder of that salary. Any other club can roster him while only paying him the prorated league minimum, which is subtracted from what the Fish pay. The Reds stepped up for that offer for a while but are now walking away after a little more than a month.

Paddack now heads into DFA limbo. He isn’t likely to have much trade appeal. He has more than enough service time to reject an outright assignment while retaining his salary. It’s possible the Reds simplify the process by releasing him. One way or another, he’ll likely be on the open market in a few days. He’ll see if any other club is willing to give him a shot. Though the results haven’t been great, there are a few clubs in need of back-end starters at the moment, such as the Phillies, Angels, Rangers, Diamondbacks, Royals and more.

Photo courtesy of Sam Greene, Imagn Images

The Reds are expected to call up right-hander Julian Garcia, reports Ken Rosenthal of The Athletic. The 31-year-old will be making his big-league debut when he appears in a game. Garcia is not on the 40-man roster, so a corresponding move will be needed.

Garcia has had a long road to the majors. He was drafted by the Phillies in 2016. The righty topped out at Triple-A with the organization, making 14 appearances with Lehigh Valley in 2021. Philadelphia released him in 2022. Garica didn’t pitch professionally in 2023, then spent time in Independent ball the following year.

The Reds brought Garcia back to affiliated ball last season. He made three strong starts at Double-A, posting a 1.13 ERA across 16 innings. Garcia posted an excellent 35.6% strikeout rate. Cincinnati bumped him up to Triple-A this year. The club also moved Garcia to a relief role. He’s continued to punch out minor leaguers at an impressive clip, recording a 37.8% strikeout rate in 21 appearances.

Cincinnati’s bullpen has struggled all year. The unit ranks dead last in the league with a 4.65 SIERA and a 5.04 xFIP. The Reds are missing multiple relievers they were relying on for high-leverage work, including closer Emilio Pagan and setup man Graham Ashcraft. It certainly makes sense to see if Garcia’s big minor league strikeout numbers can translate at the highest level.

Photo courtesy of Frank Bowen IV of The Enquirer via Imagn Images

NEW YORK — The New York Yankees were built to be the type of lineup that would finally break Chase Burns’ incredible streak.

Burns’ game is built on his ability to get swing and miss on pitches outside of the strike zone. The Yankees have the fifth-lowest chase rate in baseball. On paper, this looked like a really tough matchup for Burns against a lineup with the best slugging percentage in all of MLB, and a lineup full of left-handed hitters (seven of them) who would force Burns to throw his changeup.

Burns took the mound with a great streak going, allowing two-runs-or-fewer in each of his last 11 starts. The Yankees presented as tough of a test as Burns has faced all season.

On top of all of that, Burns wasn’t executing his pitches all that well on Sunday at Yankee Stadium. This was very far from his best night.

He still allowed just one run in five innings, keeping the streak alive and earning the win as the Reds beat the Yankees, 4-1. As the Reds claimed the series victory, Burns tied Edinson Volquez’s team record for most consecutive starts (12) allowing two runs or fewer.

“You’re not going to feel your best every time,” Burns said. “You’re not going to have your swing and miss stuff every time. Just go out there and put up as many zeroes as possible.”

Burns now has a 2.00 ERA, which is the fifth-best in baseball. Before the game, Yankees manager Aaron Boone spoke about how Burns is having an All-Star caliber season and is becoming a young ace.

Burns has had plenty of starts this year where he has been firing on all cylinders and mowing through lineups. Sunday wasn’t one of those days.

“I know he has high standards,” Tyler Stephenson said. “Outings like this are going to make him an even better pitcher. It shows a lot. Whenever a pitcher is able to throw anything they want wherever they want, that’s special. To not feel good and go out and do what he did against a really good team, that’s really impressive.”

The Yankees were a bad matchup for Burns. Their talent, the way that they don’t chase and the number of left-handed hitters in their lineup presented some difficult challenges.

Burns needed 96 pitches to get through five innings on Sunday, and he walked three batters.

“Some of that isn’t Chase, some of that is the Yankees,” Terry Francona said. “There’s not a lot of chase in that lineup. I do think there are hitters he’s going to learn, when you get to the bottom of the order, he threw a 3-2 breaking ball to walk their No. 9 hitter. He’ll learn that stuff as he goes. He is now. He kept them off the board except for one.”

That one, Francona said, was on a special swing by MVP candidate Ben Rice. You don’t see hitters catching up to 98 mph fastballs from Burns that are several inches above the strike zone, let alone driving them over the right field fence like Rice did on Sunday.

On that swing, you tip your cap. And that was the only run that Burns allowed all day.

“He’s an ultra-competitor,” Stephenson said. “He probably wants to go nine innings and punch everybody out. It’s the growth that he has. He’s itching to grow and get better. It’s special.”

The Yankees’ aggression on the bases presented another challenge for the 23-year-old starting pitcher. Heading into the game, the Reds expected that the Yankees were going to try to run on Burns. Pregame, the Reds’ coaching staff faced another dilemma.

“One of our challenges is not trying to give him too much,” Francona said. “The Yankees are so good right now at stealing bases. If you give him too much, you forget about pitches. You give him a little bit and don’t overwhelm him.”

The Yankees did steal six bases off of Burns. But every time they created a scoring opportunity Burns beared down and escaped the jam. The only run he allowed on Sunday was Rice’s solo homer.

After the game, Burns wasn’t patting himself on the back for this start.

“I was trying to be too pretty and get the corners too much,” said Burns, who added that he wished his execution was better against the Yankees.

Burns shouted out assistant pitching coach Matt Tracy for helping him lock back in on the cues that typically lead to success with Burns. Reliever Chris Paddack, who taught Burns a brand new changeup last month, also deserves a shoutout. This was a game where Burns needed to keep talented left-handed hitters off balance, and Burns got five strikes and a groundout on the nine changeups that he threw on Sunday. He used his changeup 28% more against the Yankees than he typically does.

“It’s a pitch he’s continuing to grow,” Stephenson said. “To have that on days like today where they’re laying off the slider, it’s a different look that teams have to honor.”

Stephenson was excited about a specific at-bat in the fifth inning against Yankees right fielder Jasson Dominguez (a switch hitter who was hitting from the left side of the plate against Burns). Burns used consecutive changeups to get a whiff and a foul tip that gave him an 0-2 count. Then, Burns finished the at-bat by perfectly locating a slider on the far edge of the strike zone for a strikeout looking.

The consecutive games streak that he has going is a testament to how consistent he has been. He hasn’t had an “off night” since April 10. The Reds need to take the next step as a team, and there have been many nights where the Reds have needed Burns to be their stopper during an inconsistent couple of months for the team.

Burns has delivered every single time.

“He’s still young,” Stephenson said. “He’s still growing. His stuff is that legit.”

Chase Burns pitched five innings of one-run ball and survived six stolen bases for his eighth straight win, and the Cincinnati Reds beat the New York Yankees 4-1 on Sunday.

Tyler Stephenson hit a three-run homer in the fourth off New York rookie Elmer Rodrguez (0-2) as the Reds withstood allowing six steals for the second time this season.

Noelvi Marte added an RBI double in the ninth.

Burns (9-1) allowed one run and five hits. He struck out seven and walked three to become the first Reds player to win eight straight decisions since Tom Browning in 1989.

The Yankees stole six bases in a game for the first time since Sept. 5, 2013. Jasson Domnguez, Cody Bellinger and Jazz Chisholm Jr. stole two apiece for the Yankees, who lead the American League with 80 steals. New York also went 0 for 9 with runners in scoring position and went hitless in its final 24 at-bats with runners in scoring position in the series.

Jos Caballero was also caught stealing in the second and Anthony Volpe was picked off first base by Burns in the third.

Ben Rice homered in the third inning as the Yankees lost for the third time in four games.

Rodrguez allowed three runs and four hits in four-plus innings. He made his fourth career start since the Yankees pushed back Gerrit Cole and the rest of their starters a day.

Domnguez and Bellinger pulled of a double steal in the first and Burns retired Chisholm on a popup. Bellinger stole second in the third and was stranded when Burns struck out Spencer Jones. Austin Wells popped out after Chisholm stole two bases in the fourth.

Reds: RHP Brady Singer (3-6, 5.32 ERA) opposes Milwaukee RHP Brandon Woodruff (2-1, 3.60) in the opener of a three-game series Monday in Cincinnati.

Yankees: Cole (2-1, 2.57) faces LHP Framber Valdez (3-5, 4.09) in the opener of a three-game series Monday in Detroit.

NEW YORK — After Elly De La Cruz rounded first base with a strained hamstring on May 31 during the series finale against the Braves, Terry Francona found a silver lining.

“He did a good job of pulling up running and not tearing that thing,” Francona said.

De La Cruz caught the injury in time to stop himself from turning for second base, starting to sprint and making the injury worse. He spent the next three weeks being aggressive in a different way, working to accelerate his rehab as much as possible and beat the projected timeline for him to return to the Reds’ lineup.

“It wouldn’t surprise me if he’s on the quick end with his want-to,” Francona said on June 1, after De La Cruz officially went on the injured list.

Two of De La Cruz’s defining traits are how much he cares, and how much he wants to play.

“He doesn’t even like coming out of blowout games,” Francona said. “He just likes to play baseball. That’s a good thing.”

De La Cruz is nearing the end of his first stint on the big league injured list, and he’s on track to return on Tuesday.

His timeline to get to this point shows a lot about the drive that makes De La Cruz the type of player that he is.

“The good ones,” Francona says, “They push.”

June 1 to June 3