The Cincinnati Reds welcomed back closer Emilio Pagán prior to Tuesday’s game against the Milwaukee Brewers, getting back the would-be anchor of their bullpen after a roughly two month absence due to a serious hamstring injury. That good news, of course, was offset by more bad news on the injury front, as that’s just apparently how things are going to be for the Reds this year.
Dane Myers hit the IL after he hit the wall in fifth gear last night’s crushing 5-3 loss to the Beers, so Ivan Johnson will get his first day as a big leaguer after being called up for bench depth.
There’s a bit more good news today, however, as Eugenio Suarez is back in the lineup again after being plunked on the hand by Pittsburgh over the weekend in what, at the time, was scary enough to make us all wonder if it was broken. Good news!
Edwin Arroyo gets yet another start as the team’s 2B for the day during his hot streak, and Matt McLain will once again begin the game on the pine.
Brandon Sproat will start for Milwaukee, and with a 6.75 ERA at home (and 5.43 ERA overall) he’s one of the precious few Brewers having a bad season so far. Of course, he fired 6.0 IP of nearly perfect 1-hit ball (wiht 10 K against nary a walk) in his first start of the season against this Reds club, so maybe he just needs to face them a little bit more to make those overall numbers look a lot, lot rosier.