Austin Hays home runs Cincinnati Reds New York Mets
Cincinnati Reds LF Austin Hays hit two home runs to right-center Friday, the day after winning a team opposite-field hitting contest.
NEW YORK – On their first day back from the All-Star break, a few hours before the game, the Cincinnati Reds players told manager Terry Francona they wanted him to join a meeting they called.
Then they presented the surprised manager with an Oyster Perpetual Rolex watch with an inscription on the back marking the 2,000th career victory Francona earned the last day before the break – worth as much as some guys’ All-Star bonuses.
“That’s like – what do they call that? Painting a pig?” Francona said.
Lipstick on a pig?
“That would be the term,” Francona said with a big laugh.
Don’t let the jokes fool you. It was an emotional moment for the 66-year-old skipper, who said he had to duck out of his postgame address with the team quickly after the big win the other day because “I had a hard time keeping it all together.”
“At least I got to tell them today how I feel,” he said.
And then they got back to work, and Francona had No. 2,001 in little more than a New York minute — an 8-4 comeback victory over the Mets at CitiField Friday night to kick off the 65-game homestretch for a Reds team feeling its playoff hopes.
“I don’t know if I’d call it the home stretch yet,” said Francona, whose club opened the post-All-Star-break schedule just 2 1/2 games out of playoff position – before Austin Hays hit a pair of home runs to the same spot in right-center, supporting another strong start by Nick Lodolo (7-6).
But Francona said the light-at-the-end-of-the-tunnel sense coming out of the break refreshed can help a team’s second-half focus.
“I think teams that have a chance to win, I think you can use it to your advantage,” he said. “I think teams are more apt to try to play the game correctly – move the runners, things like that – when you have a chance to win. And it’s just frankly way more fun.
“You show up, you’re a little bit nervous sometimes you have some anxiety — but it’s because you think you have a chance. That’s meaningful.”
Francona should know. His teams historically have gotten better in the second half. In the 10 non-pandemic seasons he spent managing small-market Cleveland in his last stop, the Indians/Guardians collectively had a .529 winning percentage in the first half — and .571 in the second. They made the playoffs half of those seasons.
If that pattern holds though the end of this season, what happened the night before they opened the second half might say as much about why it holds as anything.
A brief, voluntary, stretch-catch-and-hit workout Thursday night in New York drew full attendance from everybody except All-Star Elly De La Cruz, who was ordered by Francona to stay away and rest.
“There wasn’t a single person in this clubhouse who was like, ‘I’m gonna skip it,’ “ said leadoff man TJ Friedl of what he said was a first for the young team. “I think it helped a lot of guys a lot. We really enjoyed it, and I think it showed today.”
Maybe it shouldn’t surprise anyone that the guy who won the pot in the opposite-field hitting contest that night is the one who hit the two home runs the opposite way the next night.
“It could have been that, or it could have been the three tacos he had (before the game),” Francona said. “But I was pretty fired up.”
Hays seemed tempted to credit the tacos, especially when he batted with the bases loaded in the eighth with a chance to hit a third homer (until drawing a walk).
“After I had two pumps, I thought it might be a sign,” he said. “They were really good tacos, too.”
Whatever the tacos did, he’s pretty sure the work the night before helped.
“I just found a nice little line drive stroke into the right-center gap (in the oppo contest), and I feel like that swing just played in perfect to the pitches I was seeing (in the game),” Hays said. “What we did yesterday translated well into the game today.”
Who knows where they go from here? The second-half schedule is tough. And they haven’t proven they can beat the teams in their division.
But Francona liked what he saw for at least one night in carrying over a half-season worth of messaging Into the restart, and responding well to the break.
“You sit around for four days, and it’s always probably the most anxiety almost of the year,” he said. “I had less this year just because the guys came out and worked out last night. I’ve never seen that before (as a full group). And I’ve been doing this for a lot of years.”
It’s not like anything changed from the first half to the second half as far as Francona is concerned or as far as the message he delivers – or has ever delivered to his teams.
“It can’t change,” Francona said. “I know there’s maybe more glare on games as you move forward. That’s why you try from day one: ‘Here’s our message, here’s what we want to do. Let’s see if we can do it.’ “
The Reds have flaws from the lineup to the bullpen, with a clear strength in their above-average rotation. They don’t have as good a group of fielders as any of the three teams ahead of them in the standings.
But Francona said they’ve listened to the message, they tend not to repeat the same mistakes and nobody’s been late for a meeting since spring training began.
By the time he became the 13th manager to win 2,000 games in the final game before the break, guys in the clubhouse had been invested in all the methods behind the numbers for months. By Friday afternoon, many of them were wearing “2K Tito” T-shirts in the clubhouse before the game.
And by the end of the night, experiencing the second-half bounce his teams have been known for?
Who knows?
“Anytime you have some down time, some time off, you want to come out with a lot of energy and hit the ground running,” Hays said. “We did that today.”
For now, all it means is that for the first time in three years – and just the second time in the past eight seasons with an All-Star game – the Reds won their first game out of the break.
They were swept in their first series after the All-Star game each of the last two years and five of the last seven.
“They looked (refreshed) to me,” Francona said.
He was talking about the workout day, but it certainly applied to the second-half opener.
Maybe after 12 years, it’s the Reds’ time to return to the playoffs in a non-pandemic year? Maybe it’s even time to win a series in October for the first time in 30 years?
If anybody should know, it’s probably the guy with the new Rolex painting pigs in Cincinnati.