Reds: Pitcher Chase Burns discusses MLB debut vs. New York Yankees
Reds rookie pitcher Chase Burns discussed his MLB debut, which is scheduled for June 24 at Great American Ball Park against the New York Yankees.
Chase Burns lived up to the hype, and offered a glimpse into the future of the Cincinnati Reds.
The 22-year-old Burns made the first major league start of his career Tuesday at Great American Ball Park versus the New York Yankees. Burns rocketed through the minor league ranks in just 13 games this spring, and his ballyhooed debut was the show-stopping performance many thought possible for the No. 11 prospect in baseball.
Burns struck out eight batters over five innings, allowing three earned runs on six hits and no walks in an eventual 5-4 Reds win in 11 innings. A boisterous crowd of 39,257 witnessed the occasion.
“Yeah, that was pretty cool,” Reds manager Terry Francona said. “He didn’t get too excited. I think he enjoyed the competition. There’s a lot to like.”
Burns struck out the side in the first inning, including Yankees slugger Aaron Judge. Burns had three more strikeouts in the second inning.
Through three innings, Burns faced just one batter more than the minimum.
The ball used to strike Grisham out in the first inning for Burns’ first “K” in MLB was tossed to the dugout by Tyler Stephenson to be made a keepsake. Grisham was short on praise for the debutant after his 0-for-4 night, saying afterward: “He (Burns) had a good fastball.”
While taking stock of the day’s events after the game, Burns said he was able to savor his debut after the initial Grisham strikeout.
“After that first strikeout in the first inning, it all kind of settled in for me that it was real,” Burns said.
Some adversity was to be expected. Burns finally found some in the fourth. Ben Rice hit a leadoff home run that inning, taking Burns 427 feet to right field and to the upper portion of the grandstand there.
Then, Judge followed with a single, Jazz Chisholm Jr. singled two batters later and Anthony Volpe tripled to score them both when his line drive to center field skipped past a diving T.J. Friedl and rolled to the wall.
Burns was undaunted. He rebounded to blank the Yankees in the top of the fifth inning, striking Grisham out for the third time in three at-bats, and inducing a fly-out and a pop-out to Rice and Judge, respectively. Burns was relieved by Ian Gibaut in the sixth inning after throwing 81 pitches, 53 of which were strikes.
Sure, the triple-digit heat of Burns’ four-seam fastball awed spectators. But two of Burns’ strikeouts came on changeups, which was a pitch he said the Reds encouraged him to use more during his time with Double-A Chattanooga, where he made eight starts this spring.
According to Elias Sports Bureau, Burns became the second Reds pitcher with eight or more strikeouts and no walks in their MLB debut, the other being Johnny Cueto (10 strikeouts April 3, 2008 versus Arizona).
Burns also became the third debut pitcher in MLB’s expansion era (since 1961) to record his first six outs via strikeout, per Elias.
“Understandable why they’re excited about him,” Yankees manager Aaron Boone said. “Not only is it a big fastball, but it profiles really well. It was jumping. And I thought he did a good job of really setting the lane at the top. Because I thought we did a job of not really chasing. We weren’t chasing out of the zone much. But he was really good at the top of the zone and mixing in enough secondary (pitches) to where he was racking up some strikeouts.
“I thought he was really impressive. Thought we did some good things against him to grab a lead.”
Most importantly, Burns’ outing put the Reds in a position to win. Other promising pitchers in the Reds system who debuted this year failed to do as much.
Cincinnati would tie the game at three on a base-clearing double by Christian Encarnacion-Strand in the bottom of the seventh inning. After a Connor Phillips wild pitch allowed Judge to score for the Yankees in the 11th inning, the Reds punched back. Spencer Steer drove in the game-tying run in the bottom of the inning.
Cincinnati would then load the bases with no outs in the 11th. With five Yankees playing in on the infield grass, pinch-hitter Gavin Lux lofted the game-winning single over their heads and into center field to plate Elly De La Cruz for the win.
Afterward, Lux’s first comments were words of praise for Burns.
“Honestly, I was excited, not to sit, but to get to watch Chase throw,” Lux said. “I mean, wow. His stuff was electric and he’s not scared at all, so to see him come in here against one of the best lineups in baseball and just go to work and not be scared and attack guys, it was fun to watch.”
Burns’ first major-league game made the Reds competitive on the night against the defending American League champion and AL East-leading Yankees. Having him up with the big-league club’s starting rotation is intended to signal the organization’s intent to compete this year.
“This is a statement of intent. Bringing Chase Burns is a statement of intent. We want to win games,” Reds President of Baseball Operations Nick Krall said on Monday. “We felt that these are the moves that give us the best chance to win games.”
Winning with Burns means keeping him healthy, and Burns conceded the coaching staff had rules for his first start. Without going into specifics, those rules appeared to factor into the decision to lift him after five innings. Francona said he noticed Burns starting to slow down toward the end of his outing, partly due to Francona’s estimation that Burns was “over-amped.”
“I’d be lying if I said I wasn’t amped up but I felt at ease,” Burns said. “Definitely, emotions were high, but I can just go out there and smile. It was fun to do. That’s all I can say. It was so fun.”