Johnny Cueto and Hunter Greene

History doesn't repeat itself but it often rhymes.

There was a time, early in Johnny Cueto’s brilliant career, when it wasn’t evident that he’d become one of the best pitchers in baseball. In his rookie season for Cincinnati, at the tender age of 22, Cueto went 9-14 with a 4.81 ERA and a 91 ERA+. He was bedeviled by a serious lack of command, as evidenced by 68 walks and 14 hit batters in 174 innings pitched.

The following season was more of the same. Cueto posted an even 11-11 record with a 4.41 ERA and almost eerily identical numbers of walks (61) and HBP (14, once again), in a similar number of innings (171.1).

Cueto’s talent was evident to everyone, but he was frustrating to many fans who wanted (needed?) him to take the leap from prospect to ACE. And it wasn’t only fans who were frustrated. Early in his third season, 2010, as Cueto struggled once again to keep the ball in the strike zone, the Reds legendary broadcaster Marty Brennaman famously muttered, “I’m not sure this kid is ever gonna get it.”

Well, as we detailed in one of my favorite chapters of The Big 50 (available in bookstores now!), Cueto got it. Two years later, he went 19-9 with a 2.78 ERA in the process of establishing himself as one of the best pitchers in either league.

I was reminded of Cueto’s path to stardom as I watched Hunter Greene’s masterful performance on Monday against San Francisco. Greene pitched 8.2 shutout innings, allowing just four hits, striking out seven and walking one. It was brilliant, and he looked very much like a pitcher who is fully capable of winning a Cy Young Award, and soon. Moreso, he’s a guy who is delivering on all that was promised when he was drafted #2 overall in 2017.

But, as you know, Greene’s first two big league seasons — at the ages of 22 and 23 — were extremely frustrating, both for him and the fans. The constant complaint: he couldn’t go deep into ballgames because he was pitch inefficient. And it was true!

Also true: he was a kid, learning his craft at the highest level of the profession. And, right on cue, Greene went 9-5 with a 2.75 ERA last year, earning his first All-Star nod. This season, he’s taken another step forward through his first three starts.

When I saw Greene pitch into the ninth, throwing only 104 pitches and very nearly collecting a shutout, I thought to myself: The kid is figuring it out. And it is really fun to watch.

I was also reminded that fans always need to remain patient with young players, and especially so with young pitchers. After all, Greg Maddux went 6-14 with a 5.61 ERA in his first full season. He turned out okay.

Related: the next time Elly De La Cruz makes a particularly bad error at shortstop, you may want to remember that he’s only 23. And a future Hall of Famer (and Gold Glover) named Barry Larkin led the National League in errors at the age of 24.

The kids are alright.

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The 2025 Reds So Far Look Too Much Like Last Year’s Version

Two weeks ago, we were optimistic about the 2025 Cincinnati Reds. They had a new manager, a deeper pitching staff, and their young star second baseman was back in the lineup. The glass was half full. Hope is undefeated in March, right?

So … about that. Cincinnati has lost each of the first three series of the season, and they’re now in San Francisco against the white-hot Giants before returning home this weekend. (That S.F. series got off to an excellent start last night with a 2-0 win, pushing the Redlegs to 4-7 on the young season.)

To say that the beginning of a campaign that began with so much optimism has been difficult to watch is understating things. It’s been brutal. As a matter of fact, this year’s club looks almost undistinguishable thus far from the underwhelming Reds of the David Bell era.

As I noted here in the digital pages of Cincinnati Magazine Dot Com, the team’s most important off-season transaction was jettisoning Bell and replacing him with a championship-winning manager in Terry Francona. Ownership never gave Bell a full roster to work with, but he presided over far too many basepath blunders and defensive misadventures. Francona, in his introductory press conference, promised to usher in a new era of accountability. Music to my ears, indeed. Read the rest of this week’s column over at Cincinnati Magazine.