Why Reds need Greene to perform after return

This story was excerpted from Mark Sheldon’s Reds Beat newsletter. To read the full newsletter, click here. And subscribe to get it regularly in your inbox.

I didn’t watch a lot of Reds baseball during my time off last week, but I caught most of Sunday’s game vs. the Blue Jays. It was Hunter Greene’s much-anticipated return from a right hip injury that put him on the injured list.

The outcome was alarming.

By the time I started watching in the third inning, Cincinnati was already trailing, 5-0, and lost, 10-3, to drop the three-game series. Greene allowed nine runs (eight earned) and 10 hits over three-plus innings. He walked three, struck out four and threw 90 pitches. He tied a career high and club record by surrendering five home runs.

“Obviously, today was frustrating and not what I envisioned coming back,” Greene told reporters after his first game since June 17 at Houston.

What struck me the most was one reason the club did not deal for a starting pitcher at the Trade Deadline for its playoff push was it knew Greene, and Nick Lodolo, would be returning this month. This was despite having the third-highest rotation ERA in MLB and plenty of prospect capital available to make a trade.

The Reds’ only addition was getting reliever Sam Moll from the A’s. Cincinnati went 5-11 -- which included a six-game losing streak -- and the rotation posted a 5.81 ERA between the Aug. 1 game at the Cubs right after the Trade Deadline and the day before Greene’s return.

If Greene had been effective on Sunday, that stretch might have been more worth the wait. Now it seems much less so, especially in light of Tuesday’s news that Lodolo suffered a setback during his rehab assignment. That reasonably puts the rest of his season in doubt.

Greene understood the Reds were waiting on him to boost their struggling rotation.

“Looking at trades and the business side of it, it's in my face. I'm not going to sit here and act like I'm not tuned in with it, but that's not my focus,” Greene said. “For me, I got to focus on myself and making sure I'm able to come back and be able to produce for this team.”

Greene’s next start is on Friday vs. the D-backs. He will need to be much stronger down the stretch for the Reds to have better than a puncher’s chance at making the playoffs.

“Everybody is playing extremely well. I want to be a part of that,” Greene said on Tuesday. “I’m trying to get back to that as much as I can. I felt like I was doing really well before I went on the IL. I am just trying to get back to that same groove, that same flow that I had and hopefully come back and do a lot better in Arizona.”