SEATTLE – About the best thing the Cincinnati Reds might have to say about traveling 2,000 miles from home only to play in the cold, get sick and lose a series is that they won’t have to worry about any more of these tough West Coast swings after the middle of May.
It doesn’t do much in the moment to lessen the sting of losing a series for the third time in their last four sets – this one cinched with Tuesday night’s 3-1 loss to the Mariners with the ballpark roof open and the Seattle temperatures dropping into the 40s with the setting sun.
Maybe that contributed to starter Hunter Greene laboring as much as he did with the slider and needing 98 pitches just to get through four innings – or Frankie Montas’ trouble with the splitter in similar conditions the night before in a two-inning start.
“I definitely don’t want to use that as an excuse. It is a reality,” Greene said of the difficulty finding better grip in the cold, dry air. “That’s the thing about traveling, and you’re in different climates. But as professionals you’ve got to be able to combat that in some way.”
Just like that, the Mariners have their first series win of the season, and the Reds have a tired bullpen.
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That doesn’t even count the $45 million third baseman – Jeimer Candelario – who spent the game at the team hotel after getting scratched from the lineup as the latest team member to get waylaid by a flu bug going around the clubhouse.
West Coast trips are rarely good times for teams from the Midwest and East, between time changes, the extra travel grind and sometimes even the regional difference with weather patterns in places such as Seattle, San Francisco or Phoenix.
“It is definitely a different climate,” Reds manager David Bell, the former Mariners player, said on the issues Montas and Greene had. “I know from spending years here. It’s just different. It doesn’t mean any team has an advantage over the another. But when you don’t play here all the time you kind of forget exactly how it can affect (games), whether it’s pitches or fly balls in the outfield.”
Bottom line: It’s not easy being Greene, or any other player coming from that far east, when it’s time for any of those handful of West Coast road trips every team has during the season.
But through a potentially fortunate fluke in the Reds schedule this season, they might not have it as bad as most seasons — maybe not even as bad as most teams — when it comes to that annual headache on the schedule. If they can just withstand a few more challenges like this week in Seattle over the next month or so.
All the Reds’ West Coast travel comes before May 20 this season. The only series they’ll play outside the Eastern or Central time zones over their final 115 games is a stray three-game series in Colorado the first week of June.
“It could be an advantage down the road. It’s TBD, totally, on that,” said reliever Brent Suter, who pitched the final two, scoreless innings for the Reds Tuesday night. “But it kind of feels like getting a workout done early in the morning and getting the hard part of the day done.”
Compare that to the longest road trip of last season, to Anaheim, Arizona and San Francisco, to finish off the month of August as the heat of their unlikely playoff chase was starting to get uncomfortable.
The Reds went from wild-card playoff position and 3 1/2 games out of first in the NL Central to two spots back of the final playoff position and 7 games out of first in the span of a 1-5 stretch on the back end of that trip.
“These trips are always a lot physically, with time changes and other stuff,” Stephenson said before Tuesday’s game. “Just to knock them out early and towards the end of the season not really have to worry about any of that, that can be a positive.”
They still have to get through the front end of the schedule, which includes a tough Texas-San Diego trip that opens the end of next week and a gauntlet a week later involving series in San Francisco, Arizona and to Los Angeles for four games against the Dodgers.
“Not ideal,” Bell said, “But yeah, once we get through it, it’ll be good.”
Until then they’ll need better starting pitching than they got the first two nights in Seattle — although Greene gave up only one run and exited with the score tied 1-1.
They’ll also need to avoid moments like the top of the seventh when Nick Martini, with men at first and second, delivered what looked like a two-out, run-scoring single to left — until Elly De La Cruz was thrown out by star center fielder Julio Rodriguez trying to go from first to third on a play that seemed to shock the Reds.
Fraley was a half-step from crossing the plate when the out was made, negating his would-be run. That left the score 3-1 instead of making it a one-run game with men at the corners.
“That’s why Rodriguez is one of the best players in the game,” Bell said. “He was a little bit on his heels. In some ways we thought it was an ill-advised throw, to be honest, because Elly’s running, and he’s just so fast.
“For him to be able to throw Elly out there was a bit of a surprise for us,” he added. “But we have to continue to run, take the extra bases. It’s a big part of our game. When teams make plays like that, we can’t let that stop us.”
Notes
Jake Fraley’s infield hit in Tuesday’s second inning was his fifth already this season, boosting him to a 17-for-38 start to the season (.447). … De La Cruz, who had a 19-game streak of reaching base via hit or walk snapped Sunday, reached three times Tuesday on a hit and pair of walks. ... when Fraley drew a two-out walk in the seventh Tuesday, it snapped a Mariners franchise record of 35 consecutive innings without allowing a walk. The Reds drew two more in the ninth, when they loaded the bases with two out, before Stephenson flied out to center to end it. ... The nine runs the Mariners scored against the Reds on Monday were the most they’ve scored in a game since August 26, when they beat the Royals 15-2 — with 49 games in between. They had not scored more than five in a game this season until then. ... The loss dropped the Reds to 9-8 and in fourth place in the NL Central, 1 1/2 games behind first-place Milwaukee, with the Pittsburgh Pirates and Chicago Cubs sitting in second and third.
