WASHINGTON — It took less than two games in the majors for Elly De La Cruz to belt his first tape-measure home run, 15 to pull off the Cincinnati Reds’ first cycle since 1989.
And it took all of 26 games – as in Wednesday night in Washington – for the other guys to start trying to play psychological games with the Reds rookie.
“And it came back and bit them in the tail,” teammate Graham Ashcraft said.
Play was stopped for several confounding minutes as De La Cruz prepared to lead off the Reds second inning of Wednesday’s 9-2 victory because Nationals manager Davey Martinez called the umpires’ attention to the strange-looking attachment to the knob of De La Cruz’s bat.