In the first inning of the Reds’ 5-1 win over the Brewers on Sunday, Johnny Cueto was thinking too much. Coming back from injury for the second time this season, he said he was trying too hard to be perfect in locating his pitches.
But mostly, he couldn’t stop thinking about getting hurt again.
As a result, Cueto didn’t come out as sharp as he would have liked. Three batters into the game, he gave up a solo home run to Carlos Gomez. In the next at-bat, he surrendered a double to Jonathan Lucroy before escaping the inning with a lineout.
“When I came back to the bench, [Cesar] Izturis came in and said, ‘Hey listen, you’re good. Do what you have to do. Just throw.'” Cueto said through translator Tomas Vera.
And that’s exactly what he did. In six innings, Cueto allowed five hits and one run on the way to his fourth win of the season. After the first inning, he surrendered just a trio of singles in the final five innings, and none of those baserunners made it into scoring position.
“The good ones usually struggle a little bit early, anyway, until they settle in and see what’s working on that night,” manager Dusty Baker said. “I only have one worry about Johnny Cueto, and that’s that his arm is OK. Other than that, we’re not worried about Johnny Cueto.”
On Sunday, the strained right shoulder that most recently put Cueto on the 15-day DL seemed fine. Before the game, Baker said he didn’t want to extend the 27-year-old right-hander too far, and he didn’t have to. Cueto threw just 88 pitches to get through his six innings of work.
“He was excellent,” Baker said. “We took him about as far as we could take him. It was a good game. We were scratching for runs, but we scratched out as many as we could.”
The first run Cincinnati managed actually came by way of Cueto. Trailing 1-0 in the second inning, Xavier Paul led off with a walk and advanced to third thanks to Rickie Weeks’ throwing error and Ryan Hanigan’s fielder’s choice. Cueto then came to the plate, and despite closing his eyes after seeing a flash, brought Paul home on a squeeze bunt to even the score.
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