ST. LOUIS – After Jonathan India had a two-hit game at Wrigley Field last week, Tyler Naquin made sure to pull his rookie teammate aside to reiterate he’s on the right path.
“I made sure he was aware,” Naquin said, “‘hey, man, you found a way in Wrigley, a packed-out Wrigley, 45 degrees, Arrieta on the mound, you found a way to just get two knocks. Whether it was a broken-bat or a rollover or whatever, you need to take that home with you. That ain’t easy to do.’”
There are typical ups-and-downs in every rookie’s season. The league finds weaknesses, exploits them and it’s on the rookie to find a way to counter back.
India has responded in a big way for a short-handed Reds lineup. He entered Sunday with a .328 batting average and .446 on-base percentage in his last 20 games with three doubles, four homers, 10 RBI and more walks (11) than strikeouts (nine).
One thing that has helped India is replacing a higher leg kick as he loads for a pitch with a toe-tap. It’s the same thing that Naquin and Tyler Stephenson do, and the trio hit together in batting practice.
“Our big thing is we always tell each other to be early,” Stephenson said. “We have fun with it. It’s been fun to see the strides that he’s made. He was a big leg kick guy, and just to out of nowhere start toe-tapping, especially to be at the big league level, and all of a sudden just change and then start having success with it, it’s pretty incredible.”
The toe-tap is just a timing mechanism. Hitting coach Alan Zinter often talks about “dancing with the pitcher,” which is simply controlling a hitter’s movements with a pitcher’s delivery. The toe-tap group is still in a good hitting position when they’re early. Stephenson had an at-bat against Adam Wainwright where he seemed early on a curveball, but he still muscled a single to left field.
India reached base in eight consecutive plate appearances this weekend against the Cardinals, hitting two homers and a double in that stretch. He was moved into the leadoff spot because of his success.
“He’s handled this season as well as you possibly can,” Reds manager David Bell said of India. “He plays hard. He’s a difference-maker, really, at second base. He has range. He runs the bases well. Even when he hasn’t had hits at times, he’s had good at-bats. He’s done things. When you can do that, it keeps you in the lineup.”
The fact that India is showing more power at the plate is another encouraging sign. He had four extra-base hits through his first 26 games. He had four extra-base hits in his first three games against the Cardinals this weekend.
“Just because he’s so aggressive, he has a tendency to try to do too much and that’s OK,” Bell said. “When he can take a step back, trust in his talent and his ability and know that he belongs here – man, he more than belongs here. He’s a good player.”
BACK SOON: Joey Votto played his first game at first base during his rehab assignment Saturday, which is the last hurdle he needs to clear before returning to the Reds’ roster.
Votto, recovering from a broken left thumb, had trouble catching balls at first base. The Reds have tried to find different padding that makes it less painful. He spent the first four games of his rehab assignment as a designated hitter.
“They said it was a little bit sore but manageable,” Reds manager David Bell said Sunday. “I’m starting to sense that he’s ready to come back. We’ll see. Not getting ahead of ourselves. We’ll let him play today and if everything goes well, I do think there’s a chance he would be back with us on Tuesday.”
Votto went 3-for-4 at the plate Saturday with a triple to the center-field wall and a double off the left-field wall.
Mike Moustakas, Bell said, is probably about a week away before the club has conversations about beginning a rehab assignment.
TEAM USA: Reds minor league catcher Mark Kolozsvary starred for Team USA over the past week as they qualified for the 2021 Summer Olympics.
Kolozsvary, a seventh-round pick in the 2017 MLB Draft out of Florida, went 5-for-11 with two homers, five runs and three RBI in four games.
“He always stood out to us in spring training, just the way he went about his work,” Bell said. “He's a well-liked teammate and he has a good personality and everything, but he also had an intent to everything he did. He had a seriousness that you see with a lot of future big-leaguers, so he did stand out to me in that way. The progress that he's made in the last year offensively has been remarkable.”
Kolozsvary, 25, was crushing the ball at Double-A Chattanooga before he was selected for the Team USA roster, which included former Reds Homer Bailey, Todd Frazier and Matt Kemp. Kolozsvary had a .349 batting average and .417 on-base percentage in 12 games at Chattanooga with eight doubles, two homers and 10 RBI.
Perhaps, a sign of his breakout was a home run against Shane Bieber in a spring training “B” game in early March.
“I know it's one at-bat and it seems crazy, it can give you a confidence that, wow, I can do it,” Bell said. “I think that kind of coincided with a lot of the work he was doing offensively. Since then, it's been fun to watch his progress. The same thing happened to me as a player one time. Mike Mussina was on a rehab assignment in Double-A and I had a good day off of him. It was like, all of a sudden, 'wait, maybe I can do this.' Even though it's one game or one at-bat, sometimes it does make a difference.
“He's more than put himself on the radar of a guy that can catch and play in the big leagues at this point.”
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