Of Course the Reds Would Lose a Series to the Pirates

It was a foregone conclusion.  The Reds pull you in, and then let you down like a Marvel movie (pick one).  Another modest win streak punctuated by a shutout loss, and to another division rival no less.  At least last time it was to the respectable Cardinals.  This time?  The lowly Pirates skunked them.  The plop back to .500 was unsatisfying the first two times, but apparently the Reds don’t think we’ve been tortured enough already.

With the 1 - 0 loss, the Reds have now been held scoreless eight times, a tie with (who else) the Pirates for the MLB high.  Those eight losses account for a third of the Reds 25 losses this year.  Even more remarkably, the Reds have now been shut out 1 - 0 four times.  That’s nearly ten percent of their games!  You’re almost as likely to see the Reds lose 1 - 0 this year as you are to see Jeimer Candelario (.113 batting average) get a hit.

Runs, obviously, win games, but being shut out a time or two definitely isn’t a baseball death sentence.  It happens. Every team goes through its struggles.

That said, the Dodgers, last year’s champ, were shut out five times…all year.  They lost 1 - 0 once.  If that wasn’t bad enough, the Dodgers’ World Series opponent, the New York Yankees, were shut out eight times all year themselves.  The Reds have equaled or surpassed both of last year’s World Series participants in that ignominious category in just 51 games.

To pour salt on the wound, the Reds followed up that dreadful performance with another: this time, a 3 - 1 stinker to those same Pirates.  It’s the thirteenth time the Reds have scored one run or fewer this season.

With the loss, the Reds find themselves at 25 - 26, back under .500 and 5.5 games behind the Cubs in the Central.  They’re also 4.5 games behind the Giants for the last Wild Card spot.  Neither of those leads are insurmountable, but with the Reds offense guaranteed a stinker or two every week, might as well be twice that.

Let’s take the 500-foot view of the situation: in the last two weeks, the Reds had a five-game win streak sandwiched between two series losses to two of the worst teams in baseball.  The inconsistency is taking on a life of its own.

There’s blame to go around, but the source of the Reds woes are obvious.  The Reds two best players, Elly De La Cruz and Matt McLain, went completely silent in the second and third games of the series (a combined 0 - 13).  It’s hard enough to score runs in the MLB – if your best players aren’t contributing, it might as well be impossible.  If the Reds are beta-testing this theory, they can stop.  The evidence is beyond clear.

Elly is still whiffing far too much to become the potential MVP-candidate his talent suggests he could be, and he isn’t hitting the ball as hard or putting it in the air as much as he did in 2024.  McLain, however, has been a complete disaster.  After missing all of 2024 following labrum surgery, McLain’s production has fallen off a cliff.  He’s striking out at an alarming rate, and off-speed pitches are absolutely devastating him (though, to be fair, any pitch is tough for McLain right now).

This puts the Reds in a bit of a pickle.  They can’t exactly bench De La Cruz or McLain.  But they aren’t going to find cheap upgrades on the open market either.  All the Reds can really do is hope for both of their young “stars” to get better.  And soon.

As the last two games have demonstrated, the starting rotation is playoff caliber.  They are ready to win now.  Even with Hunter Greene sidelined, this group has continued to pour it on against opposing hitters.  Nick Martinez threw six innings of four-hit, one-run baseball on Tuesday night, and Brady Singer added five innings with only two runs allowed on Wednesday afternoon.  None of it was enough to prop up this sluggish offense.

The options for improvement on the trade market are thin as well.  Luis Robert Jr. was a Reds target back in the offseason, but he doesn’t seem so appealing with a .182/.276/.302 slash-line.  Ryan O’Hearn, Cedric Mullins, or Ramón Laureano are possibilities if the Orioles see fit to blow it up, but they’d demand at least one of the Reds top pitching prospects in return, and all would be free agents after the season.  Sadly, there just isn’t a lot of talent to be had at the deadline this year.

Until De La Cruz and McLain realize their potential, don’t expect the inconsistency to stop.  The occasional Will Benson moment will be fun, and hopefully Noelvi Marte and Christian Encarnacion-Strand can help when they return from the IL, but without De La Cruz and McLain playing to their abilities, the Reds are essentially playing with one arm tied behind their back.  The starting rotation can only do so much to support an offense that’s crumbling without its cornerstones.