Nick Lodolo and Bryce Bonnin will both return to the mound this week. For Nick Lodolo, he’ll be returning to the mound with the Double-A Chattanooga Lookouts on Tuesday night. He will be limited to just two innings pitched in his return. Assuming that goes fine, he will then head off to the Futures Game for Sunday.
It will only be the 7th start of the season for Nick Lodolo. He’s missed the last three-and-a-half weeks with a blister on his pitching hand. But he also missed a start the first week of June with a blister, too, before returning to the mound on the 12th. In that start he left mid at-bat in the top of the 4th inning when the blister re-appeared. Cincinnati was more cautious with things this time around in bringing him back.
In his time with the Lookouts, Lodolo has been dominant. He’s allowed a run in only two of his starts, and has an ERA of 0.90 through 30.0 innings pitched where he’s allowed just 19 hits, no home runs, walked just six batters (but also hit five), and he’s struck out 45 of the 116 hitters he’s faced. Opposing batters have hit just .181/.259/.210 against him on the season.
Bryce Bonnin missed the first two months of the season. The Reds 3rd round draft pick from 2020 made his professional debut last week in a rehab start for the Arizona Complex League Reds. The right-handed starter threw 4.0 innings while allowing a run on two hits and a walk, striking out 7, and he was throwing 96-98 MPH. That’s a pretty big jump in velocity from the 93-95 MPH he was working at while at Texas Tech in the spring of 2020 before the cancellation of the college baseball season.
Louisville to get more big league rehab time
Michael Lorenzen is joining the Louisville Bats this week. He’s scheduled to pitch on Tuesday and Thursday. After that a decision will be made as to whether the next step is to join Cincinnati in Milwaukee or to pitch another game for the Bats in Triple-A. Jeff Hoffman is also scheduled to make another rehab start with Louisville on Wednesday.