The Redlegs dropped back into last place after another weekend of struggles in which they dropped a series against San Francisco, including Friday night’s disaster when Giants starter Blake Snell twirled a no-hitter. Entering play on Monday (when the Reds won 10-3 in Miami), Cincinnati had lost nine of their last 15 games and, with roughly 50 games remaining in the season, the Reds have the fourth-worst record in the National League. This club is going nowhere fast.
Yes, it’s becoming apparent that this is yet another lost season, like most campaigns over the last three decades. So many things have gone wrong, from injuries to poor performances to Phil Castellini actually getting a promotion. But some things have gone right, if you can believe it! We’ll have plenty of time to unpack what exactly went wrong this season. Let’s take a moment to discuss the positives.
At the top of that list is this: 2024 is the year when Hunter Greene officially became an ace. After an uneven start in which Greene continued to frustrate certain segments of the fanbase with his inability to pitch deep into games, the former first rounder has continued to improve all season long. He’s now 8-4 with a 2.83 ERA, numbers that were good enough to earn him a spot on the NL All-Star team for the first time in his career.
Over the last month, however, Hunter has been the best pitcher in all of baseball, with a 0.27 ERA since the calendar flipped to July, and he’s currently working on a 21-inning scoreless streak. He’s a legitimate contender for the Cy Young Award, and he’s only 24. In a season when chaos seems to reign for the Redlegs, Greene has unquestionably been the brightest spot.
His battery mate, Tyler Stephenson, has been another positive. By all accounts, his defense has improved markedly, and he has above-average numbers at the plate as well: .241/.321/.438, 108 OPS+, a career-high 13 home runs. Maybe he also has some voodoo magic working for him, since the Reds are 42-30 in games where Stephenson was the starting catcher and 12-28 with other yahoos behind the plate. (His secret: girl dad power!)
Other than Greene, however, nothing has been more exciting about Cincinnati’s 2024 season than the continued development of Elly De La Cruz. Elly is now hitting .261/.347/.496, leads the league in stolen bases (57), and with a pair of dingers on Monday night now has 20 home runs (to go along with 24 doubles and seven triples). Yes, he still strikes out too much, but he’s second on the Reds in walks and he’s only 22.
Like Greene, Elly made his first All-Star team this summer. He’s clearly been the club’s best hitter, and I expect that we’ll look back on 2024 as the last season in which De La Cruz wasn’t generally considered to be the best shortstop in the league. The Elly Era is upon us, and it is glorious.
The Hunter and Elly Show is the most glaring highlight in a largely disappointing season, but there have been other positives, even if you have to squint a little to see them. Andrew Abbott has avoided a sophomore slump (9-8, 3.41 ERA, 126 ERA+), and Nick Lodolo has an above-average stat line (8-4, 3.99, 107 ERA+) despite continuing injury concerns and a rough July. The triumvirate of Greene/Abbott/Lodolo is a solid top three in the rotation going forward, and all are 26 or younger.
I’m really squinting hard to find something good to say here, but if you’re a Reds fan, you do have to be happy about Jonathan India’s season. He’s largely struggled since his Rookie of the Year campaign, but he has been Cincinnati’s second-most productive hitter this year, currently hitting .262/.367/.403 with nine home runs. We aren’t exactly making comparisons to Joe Morgan here, but for a season in which everyone expected he’d be traded or relegated to the bench it’s been good to see India play his butt off every single night and get some results for the effort.
OK, this is a stretch, but we’re looking for reasons to be optimistic about next year. Well, is it possible that the Reds have been incredibly unlucky this year? Based upon the Pythagorean Theorem of Baseball, Cincinnati’s record this season should actually be 60-52, given the number of runs they’ve scored versus the runs they’ve allowed. Alas, that’s just math nonsense and it was my understanding there would be no math. In actual game results, the Reds are 54-58. Not great, Bob!
I give up. The only other good thing I can say about this terrible, horrible, no good, very bad season is that we gained a number of new additions to the obscure former Reds pantheon. Think about it: Five years from now, if you are perusing the 2024 Reds page on baseball-reference, will you remember that a guy named Yosver Zulueta played for Cincinnati? What about Jakob Junis or Eric Yang or Conner Capel or Levi Jordan? And yet it happened! What a time to be alive.
On the Monday night television broadcast, the crafty lefthander Chris Welsh described Cincinnati’s season thusly: “The Reds are running in sand right now. Maybe a little bit forward, but not anywhere nearly as fast as” you’d hope. Yep, that describes things as they stand pretty well. But at least we have Hunter and Elly, right?
Chad Dotson helms Reds coverage at Cincinnati Magazine and hosts a long-running Reds podcast, The Riverfront. His newsletter about Cincinnati sports can be found at chaddotson.com. He’s @dotsonc on Twitter.
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