The Brewers jumped out to an early lead, but Cincinnati battled their way back over the course of the game. It wasn’t until the 7th inning that the Reds were able to tie the game up and later in the inning they took the lead. From there the bullpen got the job done as they sealed the win over their National League Central counterpart.
The Highlights
The game could have gotten out to a much better start for Nick Lodolo. Cincinnati’s left-handed starter gave up back-to-back home runs to begin the game. Caleb Durbin led off with his 2nd homer of the spring. Vinny Capra connected for his 4th home run this spring, and it was his 3rd against the Reds while out in Arizona over the past two weeks. Lodolo settled in after that for a bit, but the Brewers would get another run in the top of the 3rd on a groundout after a single and a walk earlier in the inning.
Cincinnati’s offense got things going in the 4th inning when Christian Encarnacion-Strand hit an absolute laser at 114.2 MPH to the wall in center for a double. Jake Fraley followed up with a walk. Stuart Fairchild singled in a run to cut the lead to 3-1. After a pitching change, TJ Friedl welcomed Ryan Middendorf by hitting a comebacker off of his leg for a single. Middendorf recovered to make a throw to first, but it wasn’t clean and led to Fraley taking the plate to score a run on the play.
Brent Suter fired off two shutout innings after taking over in the 4th inning. Tony Santillan followed up and he gave up a run on two hits and a walk in the 6th inning. Cincinnati got that run back in their half of the frame when Jose Trevino led off with a single and was then pinch run for by Carlos Jorge. He would get to second on a balk and then score on a single back up the middle by Rece Hinds.
In the 7th inning the Reds took advantage of two walks as Jacob Hurtubise and Austin Callahan picked up a free pass against Trevor Megill and then executed a double steal. Hector Rodriguez then hit a grounder to third base with two outs, but Zavier Warren’s throw to first base was wide and pulled Ernesto Martinez Jr. off of the bag, allowing Hurtubise to score the tying run.
Milwaukee brought in Chase Costello to face Austin Wynns and on the third pitch of the at-bat, Hector Rodriguez took off for second base and when the throw went to second base, Austin Callahan took off for the plate and scored without a throw to put Cincinnati up 5-4. Joe La Sorsa and Randy Wynne would close the game out for the Reds as they threw a perfect inning reach in the 8th and 9th.
You can see the box score for the game here.
News and Notes
The double by Christian Encarnacion-Strand at 114.2 MPH is a new career high in terms of exit velocity for the infielder where we have public data. His previous high was 114.0 from 2023 when he was in Triple-A.
Elly De La Cruz went 1-1 with a single and two walks. He now has more walks (4) and extra-base hits (5) than he has strikeouts this spring (3). His OPS this spring currently sits at 2.032 through 17 plate appearances.
The Reds were picked off three times in the game.
Jacob Hurtubise continued to get it done. He walked in his only plate appearance in the game, stole two bases, and scored a run. The outfielder is hitting .600/.692/1.000 through 13 plate appearances.
Tuesday’s Game
Cincinnati is back to playing in the afternoon on Tuesday. But they will also be playing a night game. That’s right – two games for Tuesday at 3:10pm ET with the first game on the road against Colorado with Graham Ashcraft, Alex Young, and Lenny Torres Jr. set to pitch. Then at 8:05pm the Reds will host the Dodgers on national television (MLB Network) with Chase Petty, Taylor Rogers, Bryan Shaw, Lyon Richardson, and Luis Mey scheduled to take the mound.
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