Opening Day in Cincinnati is special. There’s a parade. There are way more fans downtown around the ballpark than the number of seats available in the ballpark. It’s truly a party and a celebration.
No city does Opening Day like Cincinnati.#RedsOpeningDay pic.twitter.com/c94PwngLbt
— Cincinnati Reds (@Reds) March 30, 2023
Not everything went well for the Reds on Opening Day, with the team falling to 0-1 with a 5-4 loss to the Pittsburgh Pirates. But not everything went poorly, either. Jonathan India looked good at the plate and he, Jake Fraley, and Spencer Steer all got on base three times. Relievers Alex Young and Derek Law came out of the bullpen and threw more than an inning and stranded a combined three inherited runners. And hey, if you’re a Castellini – you got a record crowd of 44,063 people to buy a ticket to the game.
But all of that happened yesterday. And one of the best things about Major League Baseball is that you get to play tomorrow. Except when you don’t. With all of the great things about Opening Day in Cincinnati, and how important and celebrated the day is, the Reds get a built in off day following the opener just in case there is a rain out and that way the team can do it all again the next day without causing any ticketing issues for fans and all of that.
If the Reds come out victorious on Opening Day, the off day to follow isn’t so much of a problem. The fan base is living off of that high of not having baseball for six months and then experiencing a positive outcome that they can sit on until the team takes the field again on Saturday. But when it’s a loss on Opening Day things don’t quite feel the same. You want to get back on the field and get that loss behind you. The fans want to try and forget about not having baseball for six months only to get it back and experience a loss to the Pittsburgh Pirates in a game that was sloppy on both sides, but saw the home team come up short of a come backs in the 9th.
The team gets back on the field tomorrow and Nick Lodolo faces off against the team that drafted him in the 1st round out of high school back in 2016. A new day. A new game. And hopefully a game that goes a bit better.
Notes around the nation
Triple-A begins
Update at 1:35pm – The game has been postponed. Doubleheader for the Bats tomorrow at 6:05pm ET.
While the Cincinnati Reds have today off, the Triple-A Louisville Bats season starts tonight. They will be on the road to begin the season, heading off to Nashville for a 3-game series. As I type this the roster for the Bats still has not been released. We do know that Joey Votto will be with Louisville on the trip and will begin his rehab assignment. He may not be the only one, either. Nick Senzel, Tony Santillan, Lucas Sims, and Luke Weaver all are on the injured list as well, but have been working their way back. If they aren’t with Louisville tonight, odds are that they’ll be joining the Bats for a rehab assignment soon. If you have MLB.tv then you should be able to watch the game as MiLB.tv is included this year. The game is at 7:35pm ET if you are interested in checking it out.
One fun thing about Triple-A this year is that Hawkeye has been installed across both of the Triple-A leagues and we will be getting access to all of the Statcast data that we get in the big leagues for the Louisville Bats. The rest of the Reds farm teams won’t begin until next week. Dayton and Chattanooga begin on Thursday, while Daytona has to wait until Friday.
Hunter Greene still throws lasers
100+ MPH pitches yesterday:
Hunter Greene 44
Rest of Baseball 38— Joel Luckhaupt (@jluckhaupt) March 31, 2023
The game wasn’t a great one for Hunter Greene. He got squeezed a little bit by the umpire, David Bell probably pulled him a tad early, and unfortunately for Greene and the Reds it just wasn’t a good day for Fernando Cruz who came in to relieve him. But hey, it’s a long season and there can still be fun things to take from the outing. And Hunter Greene throwing more 100 MPH pitches than the rest of the league combined is a fun takeaway. Those 44 fastballs over 100 MPH don’t include two that took place during the at bat against Andrew McCutchen where it was initially shown that Greene hit 105.2 MPH. That pitch, along with another one, were removed from Statcast as it was believed to be a malfunction.
