Cincinnati Reds starting pitcher Brandon Finnegan will make a rehab start for the Louisville Bats on Monday night. The left hander is coming off of a simulated game thrown on Wednesday. In that game he and Cody Reed faced off against some of the Bats just prior to the start of the Triple-A season.
For Brandon Finnegan, he’s looking to get through the start healthy and return to the Reds rotation. After missing nearly all of the 2017 season with two different injuries (a muscle problem near his left shoulder, then requiring shoulder surgery to his right, non-throwing shoulder after an accident on a boating deck), the lefty had a strained biceps muscle in the spring, which set him back by about a week. But, when you couple that with the fact that he got started in the spring a week behind the other pitchers, he’s behind the rest of the pitching staff.
What a rehab start for Brandon Finnegan means for the Reds rotation is that Cody Reed will step in on Monday for the big league club. He has yet to pitch this season after the rain out led to the team skipping the 5th spot in the rotation. Reed has gotten his work in since spring training, and threw 5.2 innings in Louisville on Wednesday in the simulated game – so he should be ready to handle a full start despite the time off.
Where will Jose Siri begin the season?
Jose Siri started out spring training in a not-so-great way, injuring his thumb as he crashed into the center field wall during the first game with the Reds this spring. As I reported three weeks ago, he was going to miss the entire spring and it’s possible that he could miss April as well before starting his Minor League season.
On Wednesday, MLB Pipeline’s Jonathan Mayo wrote a preview of sorts on the Reds farm system for the 2018 season. In there, it included “Where the Top 30 Prospects will start the season”. In there it lists Jose Siri as being on the disabled list, but projected to start in Double-A with Pensacola. That would have meant skipping completely by Advanced-A Daytona, an aggressive move for the 22-year-old Siri.
On twitter, Mayo was asked about the projection of Jose Siri heading to Double-A and he noted that it wasn’t so much an opinion, but “what he was told“. I reached out to someone in the organization to ask about it and was told that the original plan was to start him with Pensacola after having a strong showing in the Dominican Winter League during the offseason, but with the injury that the decision hasn’t been decided for when he is ready to begin the year.