CINCINNATI — Joey Votto watched most of Monday’s game against the Cardinals from the rail atop the Reds’ dugout at Great American Ball Park. The moment that resonated with him? Matt McLain’s fourth-inning at-bat against Cardinals starter Jordan Montgomery.
McLain was making just his sixth big-league appearance and already had a pair of hits off of Montgomery when he came up in the fourth with runners on first and second. McLain, who hit his first career home run in Tuesday’s game, ended up striking out in the at-bat, but it took 13 pitches, as he battled back from an 0-2 hole and finished with eight foul balls.
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“I think there’s something to that, I don’t know what, but I think there’s something to that,” Votto said. “It’s hard to make contact with the ball, and the pitcher isn’t just trying to hump it down the middle. I think it is hard to make contact with the ball. I do think it reflects something, I just don’t know what.”
Votto noted that most of the fouls were “relatively close” and that it was a good sign.
He wasn’t the only one to notice. A day later, Reds manager David Bell was still impressed with McLain’s at-bat.
“It starts with the ability to hit a fastball and be confident enough, especially when you get to two strikes, to know you can get to the fastball and still trust yourself enough to let the ball travel,” Bell said. “That’s what created the great at-bat. A lot of times, when you put yourself in between like that, you foul pitches off. That guy changes speeds really well. That’s what he needed to do. It could have ended differently, but the guy just made a great pitch.”
As for McLain, it was a strikeout. Yes, with a little distance he can see some positives, but even roughly 15 hours removed from it, he still saw it as a strikeout.
“I mean, there were pitches I should’ve hit,” McLain said. “At the same time, I saw everything he had and I’ll see him again.”
Before Tuesday’s game with the Cardinals, McLain agreed to go through the at-bat pitch-by-pitch with The Athletic.
On Monday, McLain was batting second, and saw two pitches in his first at-bat — doubling off of a curveball to drive in the game’s first run. In the third inning, McLain jumped on the first pitch he saw — a sinker — and singled to right.
That meant he’d seen just three pitches — a four-seam fastball, curveball and sinker — in his first two at-bats combined.
“At that point, I saw everything but the changeup and I knew he threw a lot of them,” McLain said when asked to describe his thinking as he came to the plate for the third time.
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The 30-year-old Montgomery throws his changeup 22 percent of the time, so a little better than one out of five pitches. McLain knew that there was a good chance he’d see one in this at-bat.
“I try not to think about that. It is in the back of my mind,” McLain said. “I’m not thinking about, ‘Let me see one of his changeups.’ I knew if he left it up, I’d hit it. He did leave a couple up, but I missed them.”
The at-bat, from start to finish:
Pitch 1: 92.7 mph four-seam fastball for a called strike. 0-1.
The fastball was in the zone and McLain watched it.
“It was kind of in, I don’t think I saw it well or something,” he said. “It was a good pitch to hit. I should’ve swung at it.”
Pitch 2: 92.2 mph four-seam fastball, fouled off. 0-2.
Catcher Andrew Knizner set up inside and the ball tailed to the outside of the plate. McLain fouled it off into the stands on the first-base side.
“He missed his spot,” McLain said. “He had some run on it. I saw it. They’ve been going away from me and I know that.”
Pitch 3: 92.2 mph sinker, called a ball. 1-2.
In Little League, you’re told that with two strikes you’re protecting the plate. Down 0-2, McLain was thinking the same thing he was told in Little League.
“I don’t want to strike out,” he said.
Behind the plate, Knizner shifted inside and dropped to one knee as Montgomery began his windup. Montgomery’s pitch didn’t quite travel to Knizner’s glove and the catcher had to move dramatically back over the plate to catch it.
On TV, Bally Sports Ohio broadcaster John Sadak said, “Great looking pitch called ball one.”
The GameDay box shows the ball squarely in the middle of the square that’s low and inside, but certainly what most observers would consider a strike.
McLain hadn’t watched the at-bat until the following day, and was surprised to see where the pitch was located.
“I didn’t realize it was a strike,” he said. “In real-time, I was like, ‘Yeah, that’s a ball.’ I didn’t even see it.”
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Montgomery, on the other hand, was sure he had the strike and strikeout.
“The umpire got me a couple of times and that could’ve changed the game,” Montgomery said Tuesday.
Pitch 4: 83.8 mph changeup. fouled off. 1-2.
That changeup McLain was ready for? He finally got it. It was on the outside corner and he fouled it off, pulling it on the ground down the third-base line.
“Changeup away — good pitch,” McLain said.
The ball bounced off the wall and the ball boy had to track it down, giving McLain a chance to step out of the box and reset.
Bell said those long at-bats can be mentally taxing.
“Every pitch, you’re going through all these scenarios and you’re calculating where you’re looking for the pitch and different pitches,” he said. “It’s a big strain mentally.”
McLain, though, said he kind of gets in a zone and doesn’t even think about it.
Pitch 5: 92.6 mph sinker, fouled off. 1-2.
“Just missed the fastball there,” McLain said. “You’ve got to hit it.”
The ball went into the stands on the first-base side.
“I just don’t want to be out in front on this guy,” McLain said. “He’s got the changeup. He’s got the big curveball. He knows where he’s going with the fastball. He’s not going to blow you away, but I just don’t want to be out front.”
Pitch 6: 92.4 mph four-seam fastball, fouled off. 1-2.
At what point does an at-bat become a long one?
“It shouldn’t go more than five,” Montgomery said.
For the hitter, it’s a tie.
“He’s trying to come in there,” McLain said.
McClain checked his swing at a ball up out of the zone, the highest pitch the 6-foot-6 Montgomery threw to the 5-foot-8 McLain.
“You’d like to hit it, though,” McLain said. “But you’re still in the at-bat.”
Pitch 7: 83.3 mph changeup, low for a ball. 2-2.
McLain spat on the changeup — just the second one Montgomery showed him. More importantly, he was out of that 1-2 hole and at 2-2 — not in the driver’s seat, but in a better count.
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“He’s got to make pitches,” McLain said. “He can’t just throw it in the dirt like 0-2.”
Pitch 8: 84 mph changeup, fouled off. 2-2.
McLain fouled the ball straight behind him.
“It’s a tough pitch, a changeup in is tough,” McLain said. “He’s trying to go low and away with it and he just kind of got around it.”
Pitch 9: 81.3 mph curveball for a ball. 3-2.
Montgomery hurried this one, the ball bouncing just in front of the plate and forcing Knizner to block it.
McLain said he saw the curveball pretty early and it was an easy take.
More importantly, it was now a full count.
“Once you get to the 3-2, it’s a free for all because as a catcher you’ve got to know what can my guy on the mound throw that he can throw consistently in the zone or at least near the zone that can get a swing,” Knizner said. “Then you have to think about the hitter. Is he a guy who is going to chase or is he a guy we’ve got to challenge in the zone?”
Pitch 10: 93.5 mph sinker, fouled off. 3-2.
“This is one I want back,” McLain said.
The ball was right in the middle of the plate and McLain donated another ball to the fans in the first-base stands.
That said, the idea wasn’t that he missed a chance at the homer, but that he didn’t take advantage of a pitch that could have ended the at-bat in his favor.
“It’s not something I’m trying to drive, I’m just trying to hit a line drive,” he said. “I’m not trying to drive it like it’s 0-0 or 2-0.”
At 10 pitches in, it had clearly become a long at-bat, by any standard At no point, McLain said, did he think about just how many pitches it’d been.
“It’s 3-2,” he said.
That was really what mattered.
Pitch 11: 93.2 mph four-seam fastball, fouled off. 3-2.
Again, McLain fouled off the high fastball straight back.
“I took a good swing at that one, just underneath it,” he said.
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Pitch 12: 84.9 mph changeup, fouled off. 3-2.
This was another high changeup and another foul straight back. Because of his size, I asked McClain if he gets pitched high a lot.
“I don’t really know,” he said. “I don’t totally know the scouting report on me yet.”
For Montgomery, some frustration was setting in.
Many hitters seem to think that the longer an at-bat goes, the more the advantage swings in their direction. Montgomery isn’t sure. But he does know this — a hit is more devastating to the pitcher than a strikeout is to the hitter.
“If you lose it as a pitcher, it’s pretty crushing,” Montgomery said. “Thankfully I struck him out. But if a guy grinds out an at-bat like that and gets a hit — or especially if a guy homers or slugs something — it’s like, man, I just wasted almost an inning’s worth of pitches and now I gave up a hit and didn’t even get an out for it. One or two of those a game can take three innings away from you.”
McLain was looking for off-speed pitches and prepared for the fastball. It was the right approach, as the foul balls continued to mount.
“He kept fouling it off. He was fouling off 95 at the top of the zone and I never executed a good changeup down,” Montgomery said. “I was a little up and he kept flipping them back. I was like, gosh, just throw a good one and you’re out.”
Pitch 13: 83.8 mph changeup, swung at for strike three.
“It’s the same changeup, I just swung over the top of it,” McLain said.
For Montgomery, it was a relief. He’d get Spencer Steer to fly out to center on four pitches to end the inning and conclude his night. Even though he won the battle with McLain, it hastened the end of his outing. He even ended it with the pitch McLain was ready for — the rookie just missed it.
“I finally threw a decent (changeup),” Montgomery said, laughing with disbelief at the at-bat. “Baseball stinks.”
(Top photo of McLain: Dylan Buell / Getty Images)