During a two-week stretch last April the Reds and Cubs played seven times. If you bracket off a 13-5 Cincinnati win, the Cubs slaughtered the Reds 55-7. Not a typo. Not the Ohio State-Rutgers football score. The Reds began those two weeks 5-1 and finished 9-10. We know the misery that followed. The Cubs went on to win 35 more regular season games than the Reds, as well as the 2016 World Series.
Here’s a fond memory from those days: J.J. Hoover, Caleb Catham, Jumbo Diaz and Ross Ohlendorf were the strength of the Cincinnati bullpen. Someone named Drew Hayes pitched in two of those early games against the Cubs.