At long last, Nick Senzel is a big leaguer. The Reds called up their top prospect Friday and he was in the starting lineup for their series-opener against the Giants, playing center field and batting second. He had a strong debut too, going 1 for 5 with two walks. Three times on base is a nice little first big-league game.
Through three innings, it appeared Senzel and the Reds were on their way to an easy win over San Francisco. Two Derek Dietrich three-run home runs helped Cincinnati build a seemingly safe 8-0 lead after three innings. That lead was not safe though. Far from it.
The Giants, starting in the fourth inning, chipped away at the 8-0 deficit. They scored three runs in the fourth, four runs in the sixth, and three runs in the eighth. By time the top of the ninth inning rolled around, the Giants were down 11-10. Stephen Vogt tied the score with a two-out homer against Reds closer Raisel Iglesias.
The Reds loaded the bases with two outs in the bottom of the ninth, though Tony Watson outlasted Scott Schebler to send the game to extra innings. Schebler eventually grounded out back to Watson on the 10th pitch of the at-bat to end the inning. Jose Peraza and Curt Casali both struck out with a runner on second base in the 10th inning.
In the top of the 11th, Evan Longoria gave the Giants their first lead of the game with a solo home run against Jared Hughes. It was a few seats fair and a few rows over the wall. Longoria also had a two-run single as part of San Francisco's three-run eighth inning.
Closer Will Smith went 1-2-3 in the bottom of the 11th to finish the game and officially complete the comeback (SF 12, CIN 11).
This is what the game looked like in win probability form. In a nutshell, this graph tells us each team's chances of winning at any point in the game using historical data. This one was all Reds until it wasn't:
FanGraphs
There were multiple points in the game where the Reds had a win probability north of 98 percent. Their win probability topped out at 99.0 percent after Longoria grounded out to start the sixth inning with the Reds leading 10-3. The Giants had a 1-in-100 chance of winning at that point and, well, this was the one.
The eight-run comeback ties the largest comeback in Giants franchise history, which had been done several times previously:
May 3, 2019 vs. Reds (down 8-0 in third)Sept. 4, 1989 vs. Reds (down 8-0 in seventh)Sept. 23, 1970 vs. Dodgers (down 8-0 in seventh)April 14, 1970 vs. Braves (down 8-0 in third)Sept. 8, 1947 vs. Pirates (down 8-0 in eighth)Keep in mind the Giants are one of the lowest scoring teams in baseball. They went into Friday's game averaging 3.16 runs per game, second fewest in baseball, and their team .618 OPS was dead last. San Francisco scored 12 runs Friday after scoring no more than seven runs in a game this season.
As for the Reds, the blown 8-0 lead is not the largest in franchise history. They've blown nine-run leads multiple times throughout their history, including as recently as 2017. Senzel's debut was pretty cool. He's going to be a star. The rest of the game? Forget about that one, Reds fans.
