Matt McLain Is Raking in Spring Training – But Should the Reds Be Buying It?

After a forgettable 2024 season, Matt McLain looks rejuvenated during spring training, and has reclaimed his No. 2 spot in the Reds lineup.

A season removed from looking like one of the worst hitters in baseball, Matt McLain is tearing up spring training.  And it’s earned him the No. 2 spot in the lineup, according to Reds Manager Terry Francona.

McLain has come full-circle.  He began the 2025 season batting in the two-spot following a lost 2024 season thanks to labrum surgery in his left shoulder.  The Reds were banking on McLain, who looked like a burgeoning star after a phenomenal rookie season, picking up exactly where he left off – and for a brief while, he did.

Going 0 - 5 on Opening Day was an inauspicious start, but McLain then went on a mini-heater over the Reds next four games, grabbing six hits, including three home runs and a double.  He drove in five runs and scored seven times in that stretch.  From there, though, McLain’s stats moonwalked past the Mendoza-line.

McLain would grab just five hits over his next 60 plate appearances.  He hit three home runs in his first four games, and he hit three more over his next 32.  He was whiffing more, chasing more, and unsurprisingly, striking out at an unsustainable rate.  On May 11 – after nearly a month and a half of baseball – McLain was mercifully moved down the order, finally carving out a niche as the Reds 8th or 9th hitter most days.

Now, after a spring in which McLain has an absolutely astounding .512/.565/1.024 slash-line, he’s regained his spot at the top of the order.  It’s a good fit, provided he can keep it up.

Expecting McLain to perform anywhere near as well as he’s playing in spring is ridiculous. Spring training stats are notoriously unreliable – players are often focused more on adjustments than results.  Hitters may prioritize pitch recognition, while pitchers experiment with new offerings.

But, there are still positives we can glean from McLain’s spring performance.

Last year, McLain didn’t look right.  His bat speed was down slightly, (70.3 in 2023 to 69.7 mph in 2025), and he wasn’t barreling the ball (10.8% in 2023 to 7.7% in 2025).  He’s never been a prolific pull-hitter, but the power to his pull-side seemed completely sapped.  None of that has been the case at spring training.

Hopefully, his monster spring is an indication that he’s completely, physically and mentally, recovered from his labrum procedure two years ago.  And frankly, it’s hard to imagine a repeat of last season’s struggles.

The difference between his rookie campaign and his most recent was stark.  McLain was worth 3.6 wins above replacement (WAR) in 2023.  That number dropped to 0.0 in 2025.  McLain was the definition of replacement-level.

Labrum surgery, though, is tricky business.  It’s an injury with an inconsistent track-record of recovery.  Fortunately, McLain had surgery on his non-throwing shoulder, which typically has better outcomes (especially for hitters).

To understand whether McLain’s apparent rebound is sustainable, it helps to look at how hitters have historically recovered from labrum surgery.

Cody Bellinger won the NL MVP in 2019 and helped the Los Angeles Dodgers win the World Series in 2020.  After undergoing labrum surgery in his right (non-throwing) shoulder in the 2020 offseason, Bellinger’s career took a nosedive.  He finished the 2021 season with -1.6 WAR.  That number creeped up to a slightly more respectable 1.3 in 2022, but it wasn’t until 2023 and beyond that Bellinger’s play returned to an MVP-level.

Josh Jung, who had labrum surgery in his left (non-throwing) shoulder in 2022, saw a similar dip in production (albeit, mostly in the minors), but followed that up with an All-Star appearance in 2023.

And Shohei Ohtani, famously, tore his labrum in his left (non-throwing) shoulder in the World Series two years ago.  The injury prevented him from pitching for most of 2025, and even though his hitting stats were still absurd, they were still a dip from his preposterous 2024 season.

So no, McLain’s incredible spring is probably not a harbinger of tremendous things to come – just ask guys like Jake Fox, Gabe Gross, Hanser Alberto, or Kevin Newman.  But what might actually be a harbinger of tremendous things to come is McLain’s positive trajectory.

It’s not that McLain’s spring is predictive of his future, but rather, it’s informing us of his present.  He’s got his confidence back.  His swagger.  He’s making consistent contact – and it’s loud.

It might be a long-shot to suggest McLain is the player he looked like as a rookie, but a player somewhere in between would still be incredibly valuable.  Even in a miserable year, McLain still managed to be a positive force as a baserunner and fielder.  If he can just get his hitting back to a respectable level, the Reds lineup becomes that much more formidable.

McLain is a perfect fit for this Reds team in the No. 2 spot.  His ability to draw walks, take extra bases, and put the ball in the air make him a player who can not only drive in leadoff hitter T.J. Friedl, but also act as a secondary leadoff man for the core of the Reds lineup in Elly De La Cruz and Eugenio Suárez.

If McLain is truly back, he’s not just a contributor – he’s an amplifier for a Reds offense that could really use the juice.