ST G18 - Reds 6, Brewers 3 (Matt McLain Continues MONSTER Spring!)

0:00Well, hey, what's going on? Happy Thursday, Nick Kirby here. Welcome to Chatterbox Reds, or Daily Home for Cincinnati Reds content all spring training long. Well, the Reds back in action on Wednesday and the Reds beat the Brewers six to three. Reds now with back-to-back wins to improve to nine and eight. Andrew Abbott started for the Reds as he's getting ramped up for his opening day start. Abbott went three and two-thirds innings through 69 pitches. He did get off to a rough start. He gave up a walk three hits, including a home run in the first inning. Now, in the second inning, he gave a back-to-back single to start off the inning, but then he picked off runner and he got South Freelick to head

1:04into a double play. In the third inning, he gave up another lead off single, but then he retired the next three batters. And in the fourth, he struck out the first batter, gave up a walk, and then got a week ground out, and his day was done, but still good to see Andrew Abbott almost get through four innings. Final line for Abbott, three and two-thirds innings pitched, six hits, two runs, two walks, five strikeouts. After the game, here's what Andrew Abbott had to say. Andrew, you said after your last start that you wanted to kind of start to pitch like you were in the regular season, do you feel like you more or less accomplished that today? Yeah, I think so. You know, Props to Gary, he had a cutter still, you know, still working on it, but didn't do what I wanted to do, and that's what's going to happen. But other than that, yeah, I felt sound, you know, don't like walking people ever, but it's going to happen, but I was able to work around it. Time it was better, you know, pitch execution was better, it was in the strike zone. So yeah, I think all in all was pretty good. You'd said more or less things feel like the road track. Yeah, absolutely. Yeah. What did Tito have to say to you as he looked

2:06like he spent 10, 15 seconds with you? Yeah, I haven't had a zero in the score column in a single inning this spring training. So I was joking with him and said it was good to see at least one in there. How do you feel like you were able to set those up? I think I got ahead of most of those guys. And then I could really just pick and choose breaking balls. Both of them were really good today, really sharp. Changeup was well executed today. So I really think it was just a toss up and then travey back there, you know, just doing what he does calling a good game. So that obviously really helps. It's like seeing this spring from a claim. Pressive. I mean, we all know what that guy can do. I'm not surprised at all. I mean, I saw him play in college. I've seen him play when he came up with me that in the 23 guys, a guy's a gamer. He's going to show up. He's going to give you all a practice. And then it's going to translate and it's looking very, very good right now. We're taking a good day for you and by you. Yeah, yeah. You know, I appreciate the defense. You know, I know it's not easy moving positions, especially when he did it just last year. He's hard worker. I mean, it takes a lot to do that. And then offensively, he's always

3:08been a weapon. He's always swung to bat really well. He's always disciplined. Has a lot of pop. So I think it's, I think everybody feels really good about where we are right now. You know, just about, you know, keep the ship steady. You know, we can have two weeks. And then let's hit the ground running. I was the race the other day. It's fantastic. It's fantastic. I got me some drivers. It was really cool. It's supposed to be a, you know, parents wedding anniversary gift and it turned it a little bit more. So, you know, I had some connections at a hometown guy racing. So I got to see him as well, which was pretty cool. But yeah, it was, it was great. I love, I love just going there watching. Emilio Pagan had a much needed good outing on Wednesday. Pagan did give up one hit, a double to Gary Sanchez, but he buckled in. He struck out Andrew Vaughn and Luis Rendefo in a scoreless inning of work. Pagan was pumping in strikes to 13 of his 15 pitches were strikes. Another guy who really needed a good outing, even probably more so than Pagan was Graham Ashcraft. And he got it done on Wednesday. Ashcraft threw a perfect

4:09inning. He struck out Andrew Vaughn. Tony Santheon gave up a solo homerun to Reese McGuire. And boy, it was not a cheap one. McGuire hit it 470 feet, 108 off the bat. He also did hit a batter. Did Santheon, but he did proceed to pick off that runner. Sam Moll somehow some way, kept his shiny 0.00 ERA intact. Despite walking three batters, Moll was able to get a double play and then a strike out with the help of a successful challenge. Moll really struggled to win strikes only 11 of his 28 pitches for strike. Sam Moll has been really good this spring, but not a good outing for him on Wednesday. Hopefully just a blip in the radar. Zach Maxwell threw a score this inning. He struck out to Maxwell hit 99.3 on the gun. And he got six whiffs on just nine swings. Alright, now to the offense, the red

5:10hot. And I mean scorching red hot. Matt McLean just kept on keeping on. Matt McLean goes three for three hits a homer steals a base. McLean is now hitting 607 with an OPS over 1800 this spring. That's just insane. Like, if you see those numbers, you think, oh, those guys put like four games. No, I mean, we're like several weeks into the spring training thing. And McLean's just crushing the ball too. Home row is at 105 off the bat. A single is at 107. Three hard hit balls total on the day. I don't know about you. It's just so hard not to get over the moon excited about Matt McLean heading into this season. Do I have a marty two for three? He had a homer and he doubled that marty starting to heat up a little bit this spring. What was it? Trevino? He was one for three with a homer. Tyler Stevenson, one for three. Dan Myers, O for two with a walk. Then T.J. Freedle, Spencer Steer and Cabrine Hayes all went O for three. Steer is hitting just a buck 92 this spring.

6:15About a Garrett Hampson. He was O for two. Hampson's now just one for 22 this spring. That is a 045 batting average. Some minor league players that did get into action. Austin Hendrick was on base twice. He had a hit in a walk. Carlos Sanchez had a hit also off the bench. About Shane Sasaki. He doubled in his only at bat. He's not two for four with two doubles so far this spring. If you don't know who Sasaki is, neither did I and I had to do a little bit of research to figure this out. Sasaki, a former third ground pick of the raise out of high school and Hawaii hasn't really hit much in the minor leagues, but he is very, very fast. He is 140 for 157 in stolen base attempts in the minor leagues. One other interesting note, Nathaniel Low was in the original lineup for the Reds on Wednesday when the Reds posted it, but then he was later taken out of it. Now there's no word whatsoever on why

7:16that could be. It could just be a mistake. Someone put the wrong line about where he could have been scratched. We don't know, but I passed along the information nonetheless to you. Some other Reds news. Reds are going to have three games on Apple TV this upcoming season. All Apple TV games are on Friday nights. The games will be April 10th against the Angels. May 1st against the Pirates and June 12th against the Diamondbacks. A really good article from Charlie Goldsmith breaking down the Reds outfield situation. I'll sum it up for you, but I encourage you to check out the full thing on Charlie's clipboard. Basically, some of you get up at the Reds are still trying to sort out their crowded outfield late in spring training. Multiple players still competing for roles. The article said, uh, centred around center field or TJ Freedle. For Encona said, they have a lot of options and they're still evaluating who fits best in left and right field. Marta is viewed as the most talented option and is working to become the starting right fielder despite some

8:21defensive inconsistencies. Well, Benson is very much impressed with a strong spring at the plate and his ability to play all three outfield position. Steer along with Blue Day and Hines, they have added competition and then Dan Myers and Blake Dunn also in the mix as well. For Encona summed it up saying quote, we've got some figuring out to do, which is a good thing. Another good article from Charlie Goldsmith who just pumps him out left and right on Reds 2025 top draft picks Steel Hall. Been a lot of praise to go around for him from Ferencona some players some coaches. I'm really talking about Hall and how athletic and how good he looks at shortstop. Here's one excerpt from that article. Halls highlight so far as coming the drills in practice. Every year the Reds big leagueers work on run downs and pickles. The Reds bring over some minor liggers to run the bases. The goal was to mess up the big league team and cause

9:23havoc. Steel Hall said that. Hall ended up trying to outrun led the crews. Barry Larkin said, Ellie couldn't catch him. It was funny. And then Ellie said to him, did you see that kid? He's fast. The shout out to you. Steel Hall and shout out to that information from Charlie Goldsmith. All right, before we get to which pictures and everything you need to know about the Reds game on Thursday and a little World Baseball Classic update as well, we want to remind you that you can call or text 988 anytime day or night. The 98 suicide and crisis lifeline is a place to get support for anything related to mental health. Whether it's an immediate crisis, simply wanting to find out how to connect with care or anything in between. It's 100% secure and anonymous way to reach out for help when you don't know where else to turn. To connect, color text 98 or visit mantherapy.org to get help. It's okay. Not to be okay. All right, Reds back in action on Thursday. It is a night game on Thursday night 905 PM at the Dodgers.

10:24This game will actually be on MLB TV. All MLB TV games are free. So I do is log onto the MLB app. You have a Roku TV. You can get it on there. Computer, your phone, iPad, just about any smart TV. You can get it. Always do is have a MLB account. It's free. Don't put into credit card. Nothing like that. All spring training games are free. This game will also be on 700 WLW. Reds going with Nicoladolo, Brock Burke, TJ Antone, Jr. Marte, and Anthony Mizwitz, scheduled to pitch. For the Dodgers, they're going with the lefty Cole Irvin, who the Reds just beat up. Tanner Scott and Alex Vesia also scheduled to pitch. So pretty good pictures going for the Dodgers. A World Baseball Classic update. Away News Wars did not play for Team Venezuela in their 75 loss to the Dominican Republic. World Baseball Classic wrapped up pool play on Wednesday. They will

11:25start the quarterfinals this weekend. The next time we'll see Away News Wars and Edwin Aroyo will be on Saturday in the quarterfinals. Aroyo and Team Puerto Rico will take on Italy at 3 p.m. on Saturday. That game is on FS1 and Away News Wars and Team Venezuela. They will take on Japan at 9 p.m. on Fox on Saturday. One last thing to leave you a really cool story. Avery Fraile the daughter of Jake Fraile will be rain the bell at Miami Hospital on Thursday to celebrate her victory over cancer. Shout out to you Avery Fraile in the Fraile family. The former Red really cool to see and read that story. All right well thanks so much as always for listening to today to Chatterbox Reds. We really do appreciate all your support. Lots of good stuff. Yesterday we had an interview with John Sedac from Greg Cuffner. He interviewed John. You can find that yesterday's podcast also available on YouTube as well. All kinds of other great

12:27content at Chatterbox for Chatterbox Bearcats. Actually two podcasts that did a live reaction show to the Bearcats lost to effectively in their season in the big 12 tournament and later they collected themselves and did some more thoughts. So two podcasts episodes from Chatterbox Bearcats in your feed. Also the Flying Lion podcast. They cover all things FC Sins and Addy great stuff there and the Stone Shield show. Stone yesterday interviewed Travis Steele, a coach at Miami. That is available everywhere your podcast. Miami is actually a specialist of this. Maybe he's already played but they played 11 a.m. in the Mac tournament in their first game. He 31 to know Miami Red Hawk. We're certainly all rooting for them this weekend. So good stuff for all around there. All right well appreciate you as always. We will talk again on Friday. Recap this game against the Dodgers on Thursday night. Go Reds.