I noticed that Michael blamed me in this space yesterday for the tardy lineup (and he’s right, it was my fault), so I’ll make up for it by doing a very timely lineup myself today …
Here’s today’s group for the finale against the Reds:
- Ben Zobrist, 2B
- Kyle Schwarber, LF
- Kris Bryant, 3B
- Anthony Rizzo, 1B
- Ian Happ, CF
- Javy Baez, SS
- Jason Heyward, RF
- Rene Rivera, C
- Jake Arrieta, P
All right. As we’d hoped, Kris Bryant is back in the lineup after a day to rest his sore hand, and it’s a good time to be back. Today’s Reds starter, righty Sal “Ray” Romano sports a .290/.383/.570 line this year against fellow righties.
Lefties have hit him well, too, so it’s not as if it’s terrible to see that he’ll face five left bats in this lineup (and no, switch hitters should hit the other side against him, because they aren’t used to doing that and would probably be awful).
As usual, we’ll have your full Pre-Gamin’ closer to game time (6:10 CT). In the meantime, read up on Mike Montgomery’s latest gem.