Castillo shows he's 'getting better and better'

TORONTO -- Reds right-hander Luis Castillo lost the battle, but he kept his team in the war.

With one out in the sixth inning, Castillo’s 10-pitch duel against Raimel Tapia concluded on a line-drive single up the middle. One pitch later, Castillo wriggled out of the inning with a double-play ball, nabbing a quality start in the Reds’ 2-1 loss to the Blue Jays on Friday night at Rogers Centre.

“That’s really what he does,” manager David Bell said of his ace, who logged six strong frames and yielded two runs on seven hits to go with no walks and five strikeouts in the Interleague series opener. “Any time he gets into trouble, he always has the ability, he has the stuff, he has the competitiveness to get out of any situation.

“It’s part of being a great pitcher. One of the best in baseball. He’s a pitch away, always, to get a big strikeout, get a big ground-ball out [or] double play. He’s a pleasure to watch pitch and to have out there.”

Perhaps the Reds take even more pleasure in that now, after Castillo began the season on the injured list with a right shoulder strain. The 29-year-old had no prior injury history, and he’d never missed a big league start.

Castillo’s impressive durability helped him earn a workhorse label. Since his debut in June 2017, no other Cincinnati pitcher has more starts (126), innings (723), wins (40) or strikeouts (782).

He’s not solely known for the quantity of his work, though. The quality has been pretty great, too.

Castillo, a 2019 All-Star, steadily posted an ERA between 3.12 and 4.30 in each of his first five seasons, maintaining a 123 ERA+ in that span.

This year, Castillo (0-2, 4.60 ERA) only has three starts on his ledger. It’s probably too early for any sweeping declarations about how he’s fared, but the hard-throwing righty is building from one outing to the next -- tossing 4 2/3 innings, then five, and now six -- and picking up confidence along the way.

“I think every time I go out there, I’m getting better and better,” Castillo said via interpreter Jose Merlos. “And we’re trying to make everything a little bit more perfect every time we go out there.”

One element of Castillo’s game that’s climbing closer to perfect is his changeup, which was once worth an MLB-best minus-28 runs in 2019.

Bell noted that Friday’s version was “the best [Castillo’s] had since he’s been back,” and the stats back it up. All five strikeouts for Castillo came via the changeup.

Another encouraging sign for Castillo was an uptick in velocity. Both his sinker and four-seamer were up 1.2 mph from their average in his first two starts, with his sinker maxing out at 98.4 mph.

Castillo was also cool under pressure, stranding a pair of runners in the second and fourth innings. But a trio of consecutive hits in the fifth led to two runs -- and the tough-luck loss.

“Definitely a big step forward,” Bell said of Castillo. “On another night, maybe next time out, he goes even deeper than that into the game and we can get him a win.”

Votto powers up in homecoming
Welcome back, Joey Votto.

In his return to his home country and to the Reds’ lineup, the Etobicoke, Ont., native received a warm ovation from the Toronto crowd as he stepped up for his first at-bat. Later on, he gave his teammates something to cheer for when he found his power stroke.

Votto blitzed a center-cut changeup in the sixth inning, pulling it into the right-field corner for a double. That marked his first extra-base hit in 55 at-bats, and it was an especially welcomed sight for a player who’d been on the COVID IL since May 3.

​​“He looks good, he looks healthy, he looks like he did before he was out,” Bell said. “It’s gotta be a thrill for him to play here in his hometown … I think we’ll get to see him, most likely, all weekend.”

Votto finished 1-for-4, but as with Castillo, Friday’s effort is something worth building on. The 1-for-26 skid that Votto carried into his COVID IL stint is not something he intends to drag him down in the months ahead.

“I have very few poor stretches in my career, and I’ve always corrected them,” said Votto, who entered with a .122/.278/.135 slash line in 22 games. “So this is another opportunity for me.”