The long awaited debut for Chase Burns finally happened. Well, sort of. Spring training games don’t really count, but for the first time since he was drafted #2 overall and signed a record setting signing bonus for a drafted player, Burns took the mound in a game in front of paying fans.
He didn’t exactly disappoint anyone who was there watching him. The first pitch he threw was a 98.7 MPH fastball for a called strike. His 18th pitch of the inning was a 99.9 MPH swinging strike that ended the inning. He would pick up three strikeouts in the inning, but did issue a walk along the way in his hitless inning of work.
Last night Luis Mey topped 100 MPH against the Los Angeles Dodgers. That was the first time this spring that a Reds pitcher had reached triple digits. In today’s game against the Texas Rangers Hunter Greene topped out at 101.0 MPH to join the list. Chase Burns also got to triple digits, reaching the 100.0 MPH mark four times, and topping out at 100.2 MPH. Two of those pitches were strikes and two were balls, just for those who wanted to know.
First professional inning for @ChaseBurns20? Three strikeouts. pic.twitter.com/JbIY80pTCc
— Cincinnati Reds (@Reds) March 5, 2025
There’s a few things worth noting beyond just the triple-digit velocity for Chase Burns. The spin rate on his fastball is well above-average. The sample size is small – he threw just 14 fastballs on the day – but he had a 2624 average spin rate on the pitch. The league average spin rate on a 4-seamer is around 2200. His breaking ball was also spinning all kinds of times on the day, too. The slider averaged 2722 RPM on the day (just four pitches). That was the pitch that had batters baffled as they swung three times at it and came up empty three times. He also had one swing-and-miss on his fastball out of the five that batters swung at.
Update at 11pm ET:
The Reds announced after the game that Chase Burns was re-assigned to minor league camp. C. Trent Rosecrans of The Athletic was the first to report this.
Cam Collier is injured
During the broadcast of the Reds game it was announced that he had injured his thumb in his last game played. There weren’t any real specifics about the injury, but it was noted that he was going to see a specialist. On twitter, Collier posted this evening “Small step back for a way better come back”. The extent of the injury and the timeline for recovery is still unknown and when more information is available I will be sure to provide an update.
Jacob Hurtubise remains hot
Elly De La Cruz may be the only hitter alive that’s having a better spring training than Jacob Hurtubise is. The Reds outfielder got on base two more times on Wednesday against Texas as he picked up a single, a walk, and he drove in a run. He’s hitting .583/.688/.917 with three walks, two strikeouts, three extra-base hits, and he’s stolen four bases.
Rece Hinds was the only other prospect to pick up a hit on the day and he made sure it counted as he tripled into right-center and later came in to score on a sacrifice fly by Tyler Callihan. Moving back to the pitchers mound, Zach Maxwell threw a shutout inning but he did give up a hit and walk a batter while throwing just 11 strikes in his 21-pitch inning.
It was the 5th inning that was the one that cost the Reds on the day. Connor Phillips walked four of the five batters he faced, throwing just eight strikes out of his 25 pitches and leaving the bases loaded with just one out. Simon Miller was called on for the third time this spring, and just like the other two games he entered with three runners on. In the other two showings he got out of the inning unscathed. That was not the case on this day as the second pitch he threw landed over the fence for a grand slam that broke open what was a tie game.
If you wanted to check out the box score for the game you can click here.