Nick Lodolo isn’t just another pitcher. Cincinnati Reds manager Terry Francona rates him as one of the best in baseball, and he returned for the club May 8 to make his 2026 MLB debut.
Lodolo, coming off a career-best 156 2/3 innings with two complete games in 2025, figured to be key for Cincinnati at the outset of a 2026 season in which the club prepared for weeks to begin the campaign without ace Hunter Greene, who had surgery in March.
Lodolo got sidetracked on the day the Reds broke spring training camp in Goodyear, Arizona. In unseasonably extreme heat, Lodolo suffered a blister that sent him to the injured list. Then, he first attempt at rehabbing was cut short with the blister returned.
His last rehab stint went well, and the blister didn’t return over starts with High-A Dayton and Triple-A Louisville. Those outings gave way to his 2026 debut with the Reds, which lasted 5 1/3 innings and 78 pitches.
“It’ll be good, and it’ll be even better as we get him into the routine and he’s going every five or six days, and let him — hopefully, there’s not a lot of rust to shake off but get him to where he’s pitching every five days,” Francona said. “That’ll be really good… He’s one of the better pitchers, I think, in the game, so we haven’t had him and we missed him.”
Lodolo allowed 22 home runs during what some considered a breakout 2025 season. On May 8 against the Houston Astros he allowed two homers.
In the top of the second inning, Houston’s Zach Dezenzo took Lodolo deep on a 95.3 mph sinker. With Brice Matthews already on-base via a triple, the homer put the Astros up, 2-0.
Lodolo worked efficiently into the sixth inning, but Yordan Alvarez hammered a 94.6 mph fastball out for a 407-foot, two-run homer for a 4-0 lead. The next batter, Isaac Paredes, doubled on the seventh pitch of his at-bat. Francona emerged from the dugout to end Lodolo’s game.
The final line for Lodolo: 53 strikes on 78 pitches, five hits, four earned runs, a lone walk and two strikeouts.
The bottom line for the Reds: Against the grain of several recent pitcher injuries and in the midst of a losing streak that reached eight games in the series opener against Houston May 8 at Great American Ball Park, Lodolo’s return from injury couldn’t have been more welcome or more timely.
Lodolo’s appearance alone couldn’t spur the Reds to victory, though.
Reds’ bats blanked by Astros starter Mike Burrows
The seven-game losing streak Cincinnati entered play with on May 8 featured defeats that took a variety of different forms. The slump started with a couple lopsided losses against the Pittsburgh Pirates. That was followed by four consecutive losses by a single run, snapping the Reds’ 12-0 mark in games decided by two runs or less.
The Reds suffered their first shutout loss of what became an eight-game losing streak in the 10-0 loss to Houston, the American League West division’s last-place team. The Astros entered the contest with a team ERA of 5.82, which was one of the worst in baseball.
The shutout was Houston’s third of 2026 as it improved to 16-23.
Just five hits against the Astros contributed to the Reds dropping to 20-19 on the year, and remaining in the cellar of the National League Central division. On April 30, the Reds were 20-11 and in first place.
Astros 26-year-old righty Mike Burrows stymied Cincinnati, holding the team to a lone extra-base hit. Elly De La Cruz doubled, and singled in the ninth. All the other hits were singles.
Cincinnati loaded the bases in the fourth inning. After JJ Bleday started the inning with a walk, Sal Stewart and Nathaniel Lowe singled with one out. But Spencer Steer flew out and Tyler Stephenson struck out to end the threat. The Reds finished the night 1-for-6 with runners in scoring position.
Burrows went seven innings and allowed only the three hits and the walk to Bleday while striking out six.
Matt McLain started the bottom of the eighth inning with a bloop single, and eventually moved into scoring position but was stranded. When the Reds came to bat in the ninth, the game had already gotten out of hand for the hosts.
Up, 5-0, entering the ninth inning, the Astros went ahead 9-0 on back-to-back homers. The first was a three-run homer by Zach Cole that landed on the netting above the visitors’ bullpen in right field, and Christian Vazquez followed up with a solo blast that just cleared the left field wall.
Then, Reds catcher Jose Trevino emerged from the dugout to pitch the rest of the inning. Partly as a symptom of the recent injury squeeze on Cincinnati’s pitching staff, plus the lopsided nature of recent defeats, the pitching appearance was Trevino’s fourth in the last 10 games.
Trevino allowed one additional run in the ninth.
This article originally appeared on Cincinnati Enquirer: Nick Lodolo makes 2026 debut but the Reds lose their eighth in a row
