On what would be, in a normal year, the day in which we all got together to watch the All-Star game, we can’t do that. But what we can do this evening is get together and watch the Cincinnati Reds face off against, uh, the Cincinnati Reds in an intrasquad scrimmage game that will take place at Great American Ballpark. Sure, we can’t actually go to the stadium and watch the game – but we can watch it online thanks to the folks over at Reds.com. As we’ve done with a few other scrimmages, when the video goes live we’ll post it here as long as MLB allows it to be an option, and we’ll have a link to the video if anyone wants to watch it somewhere else.
The game this evening is set to begin at 5:45pm ET. There are six pitchers set to go today:
- Sonny Gray
- Michael Lorenzen
- Nate Jones
- Joel Kuhnel
- Robert Stephenson
- David Carpenter
This should be the second to last start for Sonny Gray before he takes the mound on Opening Day next Friday against Detroit. There are no number of innings listed, but it wouldn’t surprise me to find out later that the game will be a five or six-inning game with Sonny Gray starting for one side, and then everyone else pitching out an inning (with maybe a guy getting two innings somewhere) for the other team. We’ll find out a few minutes before the game starts when we see the lineups. The media isn’t allowed in the stadium until 15 minutes before the game is set to start, so we wind up without much lead time on these kinds of things in 2020.
Watch live
If you want to watch live, you can hit play below, or you can follow this link to watch it on Reds.com.
Cincinnati Reds Lineups
Away Reds |
Home Reds |
| Jesse Winker – LF | Shogo Akiyama – LF |
| Phillip Ervin – CF | Joey Votto – 1B |
| Josh VanMeter – 2B | Eugenio Suarez – 3B |
| Matt Davidson – 1B | Mike Moustakas – 2B |
| Mark Payton – RF | Nick Castellanos – RF |
| Kyle Farmer – 3B | Freddy Galvis – SS |
| Alex Blandino – SS | Nick Senzel – CF |
| Curt Castali – C | Francisco Pena – C |
| Sonny Gray – P | Michael Lorenzen – P |
| Nate Jones – P |
Pre-Game Reds news and notes
Two nationally televised games for the Reds
First reported by C. Trent Rosecrans of The Athletic, the Cincinnati Reds will be on national television twice this year. Fox Sports 1 will have the rights to the August 1st game against the Detroit Tigers, in Detroit, and to the home contest against the Pittsburgh Pirates on August 15th.
David Bell continues to talk well about Jose Garcia
Earlier this afternoon manager David Bell had some good things to say about Jose Garcia to the media during his daily press conference.
Here's what David Bell had to say about #Reds shortstop prospect Jose Garcia earlier today. pic.twitter.com/blIxPkX5GT
— Doug Gray (@dougdirt24) July 14, 2020
Yes, I did just embed my own tweet. I spent the time making the fun graphic, so I’m going to share it here, too.
To continue the lovefest that has been going on for Jose Garcia, Freddy Galvis also had some good things to say about the young shortstop yesterday, which I wrote about over at RedsMinorLeagues.com. And there’s also some praise in there for pitcher Tejay Antone from David Bell, too.
Yasiel Puig to sign with the Braves
Everyone’s friend, and former Cincinnati Reds outfielder, Yasiel Puig is going to be signing with the Atlanta Braves according to Mark Feinsand of MLB.com.
Yasiel Puig is signing with the Braves, per source.
— Mark Feinsand (@Feinsand) July 14, 2020
Doug. Lets say the season gets finished all the way including the world series. The Reds win the whole thing. Do you think it will come with a askriek? Will it be like 1919?
I don’t think the season gets finished. I am not convinced it will even start. But anything is possible and fingers crossed it does get finished.
So far, and it’s only been a couple of weeks, but there haven’t been any apparent cases of the virus spreading wildly through a clubhouse and sidelining a significant portion of the roster. What MLB is doing so far is apparently working, at least to an extent. We’re hearing of a couple or even a handful of players testing positive for COVID every day, but as mentioned, nothing like 10 or more members of a team.
There was a case in Florida where it was at the Phillies training complex, I believe, that it seems five or more people were positive, and they closed that down.
I’m sure plenty of fans will try to put an asterisk on it, but I know that I know that whatever team wins, their fans are going to be celebrating it just like they would any other year.
About the asterisk: It’s certainly true that all teams are facing the same situation. But, hypothetically, if a team or teams had their lineups decimated by a covid outbreak, it would certainly change the season. Would such events be asterisk worthy?
I’ll still say no – if Max Scherzer blows out his elbow, it’s going to change the season for the Nationals. Would that get another team an asterisk because they didn’t have to face Scherzer in the playoffs?
I know that a lot of people will give the season an asterisk no matter what. They can do what they want. It counts for me as long as they hand that trophy to a manager at the end of October.
Good point, Doug. I was thinking more along the lines of a team losing most of its starting lineup for 14 days or more–or even worse–a scenario not totally unrealistic, given how contagious the virus is. But the asterisk doesn’t really benefit the game, so it does seem unlikely.
For the fans of the teams that make the post-season this year, there will be no asterick. But for the fans of the teams who miss out on the post-season, there will always be an asterick.
Too many questions of “what if’s” and “if only’s” will be raised by fans who will be convinced that their team would have made the post season, and competed for the World Series title, had the normal 162 game season been played out.
And the legitimacy of the 2020 season will be especially disputed if a heavily favored team like the Dodgers or Yankees or the Nationals gets nosed out by a lesser team because of a ten-day slump by a star player.
Sounds like that if anything happens to Galvis injury-wise or illness-wise, we might see Garcia inserted as the starter at least until Galvis is ready.
I think 2021 is just about a given, provided Garcia continues to impress. I don’t think that during spring training, despite his impressive showing, that Garcia was in the plans in any way for 2020. That seems to have changed.
Lineups?
No one at the ballpark has shared one yet.
There might not be a formal “lineup” today. Michael Lorenzen pitched for one team and now he’s hitting for the other.
we definitely havent seen aquino hit yet though right?
https://twitter.com/Reds/status/1283159883827884032/photo/1
For those of you that have twitter. Reds responded with lineups to my request.
Well, they just showed the scoreboard and here’s one of the sides:
Home Reds
Shogo Akiyama – LF
Joey Votto – 1B
Eugenio Suarez – 3B
Mike Moustakas – 2B
Nick Castellanos – RF
Freddy Galvis – SS
Nick Senzel – CF
Francisco Pena – C
Sonny Gray – P
Well, Sonny Gray is actually pitching against this team, not on this team. But hey, I can only pass along what the scoreboard said.
Rob. You think they will have an extra hitter for the other team since lorenzen hit? im doubting it but i don’t see why they wouldn’t want to see an extra players at bat.
I am also still mystified why the heck Mark Payton is in this camp over aquino when he is striking out 60 percent of the time with no hits in these 5 scrimmages so far. Dude cant hit a dead red fastball and his teammates have figured it out. Yet aquino had 6 at bats and has a homerun with maybe other hits that im not sure about if you could let me know.
The Reds have had an extra batter only during away team at bats in these intrasquad games. The regulars (home team) players are getting all of their at bats.
Doug is there anyway you could let me know if Aquino has had any other hits except the homerun from what you have seen? And has he struck out?
Payton just struck out again. He CANNOT hit major league pitching.
He looked pretty good in televised spring training games from Arizona. Too early to give up on him.
Tom. I wouldn’t be saying to give up on him if he hadn’t seemed to take aquinos spot at great american ball park. I mean we are really going to say 30 home runs in the minors is more impressive than aquinos showing in the majors. Sure he has struggled but too put him at prasco and only play him in two of 5 scrimmages so far is pathetic. They need to either give aquino the shot he deserves or trade him . Its a simple concept play him or trade him.
Aquino, Payton – it doesn’t matter – neither of them is playing much at all in 2020 unless there are several injuries.
Doug your probably right. That’s why i feel they should trade him. there would be interested teams if they put him out their on the market and said they would trade him. He would get playtime on many other big league teams. I mean you’re telling me the pirates or giants or tigers or many other teams wouldn’t trade for him and have him starting on opening day. The reds need to either play him or trade him. Not sit him on the bench all year.
He isn’t going to sit on the bench – he’ll be playing over at Prasco Park.
Can you see aquino getting more opportunities with the reds next year providing he plays decent in the time he does get. Of course the dh would need to be permanent for him to have a shot.
Didn’t Aquino go something like 1-20 in ST with a ton of strikeouts?
Didn’t Aquino hit .196 last September?
@sean Keely, give it up, this crowd doesn’t like Aquino. You pleas for sanity will fall on deaf ears. I don’t think the Reds are really that short sighted. After they signed Castellanos, Aquino became less valuable, and therefore able to be stashed away another year, or until some injury happens. His lack of love is just because of his redundancy. Senzel offers CF capability, Winker punishes RHP, Shogo is a leadoff high OBP guy, Ervin is Winkers mirrored half, and Payton and Jankowski are good defenders that bat from the other side. Lack of performance or injury will get the Punisher back on the Reds roster soon.
Gray looked great. None of the hitters really stood out.
I’m VERY discouraged to see Votto in a deep crouch, choked up, and check swinging again. He had 1.5 years of very low production with this approach, after emerging out of the other side during the 2nd half last year.
With opening day a little more than a week away and a short season ahead, it’s not encouraging to see Votto back in a crouch, choked up with a checked swing. But, Votto is a hitting artist so we’ll see what happens.
It is interesting on Votto’s stance. That is about the third different stance I have seen from Votto in this “summer camp.” The previous game, he was more upright in his stance.
Was david bell there today ? hes he been confirmed as there? I would assume so?
Does anybody know aquinos overall stats from the two scrimmages hes been in. I missed both unfortunately. I know he went deep once but thats it.
Love seeing Senzel back in there. For those who have been watching, who is killing it in camp?
If only Billy Hamilton could have become a “girls softball slap hitter” he’d been a perennial all star.
David Carpenter looked great during the scrimmage. Have to keep an eye on him!