Cincinnati Reds: Michael Lorenzen may have to help himself today

Michael Lorenzen, who has 4 home runs on the season, may have to tap into his power at the plate today when the Cincinnati Reds take on Miami. The Reds offense has been nonexistent over the course of this road trip.

Mercifully, the Cincinnati Reds road trip is coming to end. For the Reds’ pitching staff the end can’t come soon enough. Cincinnati’s pitchers have received very little run support at all during this recent road trip while putting up fine outings themselves. Michael Lorenzen takes the mound in the series finale, and he may have to take matters into his own hands.

Lorenzen has 4 home runs on the season. He’s hitting .296 in only 27 at-bats. He has .345 on-base percentage and leads the team with an absurd 1.123 OPS. Those numbers look very impressive because Lorenzen has fewer at-bats than most of the position players, but it’s still impressive.

With the way the Reds’ bats have been over the last several games, Lorenzen may have to hit two runs in today’s game in order to pick up the win. Heck, Luis Castillo pitched possibly the best game of his life on Friday night and it wasn’t enough to pick up the win.

More from Blog Red Machine

• Reds vs. White Sox: Pitching preview, prediction, and more
• Reds: Reiver Sanmartin adds another twist to offseason roster construction
• Reds: Signing Tyler Mahle to a contract extension should be a top priority
• Reds: Reiver Sanmartin should get first major league start vs Pirates
• Reds should unquestionably bring Wade Miley back in 2022

Castillo went 8.1 innings and allowed no earned runs. Of course, the Marlins didn’t allow the Reds to get on the board either. Castillo exited midway through the 9th inning and with the Reds unable to scratch across a run in the top of 10th, Issac Galloway’s RBI double in the bottom of the inning sealed the walk-off win for the Marlins.

Let’s look at the Reds’ offensive output over the last several games, shall we? The Reds started this 10-game road trip in Chicago. The Reds took 1-of-3 from the Cubbies and scored only 4 runs in the 3-game series. Even worse, the Reds only allowed 5 runs. Ouch!

Looking back at the Reds’ 3-game series with the Brewers wasn’t any better. While in Milwaukee the Reds scored only 3 runs. The Brewers’ bats were in rare form, especially MVP-candidate Christain Yelich, as Milwaukee scored 16 runs in that series.

Now, against the Marlins, who hold the worst record in the National League, the Reds have been able to only put up 5 runs through 3 games. Conversely, the Marlins have only scored 7 runs themselves.

With the All-Star bats of Eugenio Suarez, Scooter Gennett, and Joey Votto, the Reds should be scoring some runs. At the very least, against the NL’s worst pitching staff. The Marlins are dead last in ERA, wins, saves, quality starts, and almost every other pitching stat you can think of.

Michael Lorenzen will not only need his arm but his bat today as well because it appears that no one else on the Cincinnati Reds is going to help him. The first pitch in today’s game is slated for 1:10 PM ET.