It’s fair to call the Cincinnati Reds the surprise team of the National League a month into the season. After entering the year without an abundance of household names, the Reds are tied for second in the majors with 18 wins.

Cincinnati will search for its 10th win in 12 tries on Sunday afternoon in the series finale against the visiting Detroit Tigers.

Despite a major-league-worst .213 batting average, the Reds have scored nine runs apiece in back-to-back wins over the Tigers and are averaging 7.3 runs across their last six outings. At .303, Sal Stewart is the only Cincinnati player hitting .300 or better.

Instead of a flashy centerpiece, the Reds have tried to break down the opposing pitching staff using 1-9 in the batting order.

“When you get this group of guys with the character we have and the way we play the game, good things will happen,” Reds second baseman Matt McLain said. “We play the game hard every single day.”

Stewart and TJ Friedl each had three hits and a homer in the Reds’ 9-2 series-clinching win on Saturday.

On the mound for the upstart club, Rhett Lowder (3-1, 3.10 ERA) will look to continue his impressive start to the year. After missing all of last season with multiple injuries, Lowder leads the Reds with three wins. The 24-year-old right-hander has won consecutive starts, and he allowed just one run across six innings in a 6-1 victory over the Tampa Bay Rays on Monday.

“He gave us six innings — that was really impressive,” Cincinnati manager Terry Francona said. “He just started to throw the ball more where he wanted to.”

Lowder, selected seventh overall pick in the 2023 draft out of Wake Forest, is slated to make just the 12th start of his career and first against the Tigers.

Detroit entered the interleague set winners in 10 of its previous 13 but has seen its pitching staff falter in a pair of games at Great American Ball Park. After falling on Nathaniel Lowe’s walk-off homer to lose 9-8 on Friday, the Tigers got just two innings out of starting pitcher Jack Flaherty in Game 2.

Manager A.J. Hinch and company will seek to fare much better in the early innings on Sunday in hopes of salvaging the series.

“(Cincinnati) put the ball in play twice in the first inning and scored four runs,” Hinch said. “That’s pretty much the tone that was set. It was rough to recover from.”

Keider Montero (1-2, 3.68 ERA) will make his fifth start of the year for Detroit. Montero, 25, will appear on the road for the first time this season. Last time out, he yielded three earned runs on five hits in 5 2/3 innings Tuesday in a 12-4 loss to the Milwaukee Brewers.

Montero has faced the Reds once, throwing five innings of two-run ball in an 11-5 win on June 13, 2025.

At the plate, Spencer Torkelson has homered in four straight games, becoming the first Detroit player to accomplish the feat since Ian Kinsler in May 2016. Torkelson can match the franchise record of five shared by multiple Tigers, most recently Marcus Thames in June 2008.

–Field Level Media

Washington Nationals shortstop Nasim Nunez delivered two hits, four RBIs and a stolen base during Saturday’s 6-3, 10-inning victory against the host Chicago White Sox.

Nunez acknowledged he was aiming to emulate one of his favorite players, current New York Mets shortstop Francisco Lindor — a path that might serve Nunez well again Sunday afternoon when Washington meets Chicago in the rubber game of a three-game set.

“Honestly, I was just like, ‘Let’s be nasty,'” Nunez said. “I told my parents before the game I was trying to channel my 2018 Lindor (then with Cleveland). I model my game after him, so I was watching some highlights and stuff. I just channeled that and just went out there to be.”

Washington evened the series behind an opportunistic attack. Automatic runner James Wood scored the go-ahead run in the 10th on a passed ball.

Nunez hit two-run singles in the fourth and 10th, and Keibert Ruiz doubled for the Nationals’ lone extra-base hit of the game.

Miguel Vargas doubled for the White Sox, who out-hit the Nationals 7-6 one night after out-hitting them 8-6 to key a 5-4 victory.

“It’s working, just putting the foot on the gas at all times,” Chicago rookie infielder-outfielder Sam Antonacci said.

The White Sox will try to rev their offense on Sunday against Nationals left-hander Foster Griffin (3-0, 3.38 ERA), who will oppose Chicago southpaw Bryan Hudson (0-0, 1.54).

Griffin is set to make his first career appearance against the White Sox. He pitched in seven games for Kansas City and Toronto over 2020 and 2022 but most recently competed in Japan.

Griffin defeated the Atlanta Braves 11-4 on Tuesday behind his first quality start, scattering five hits for three runs in six innings with one walk and three strikeouts.

“We hadn’t seen him before; that’s always a challenge,” Braves manager Walt Weiss said. “He’s got a lot of pitches. He’ll throw the kitchen sink at you. When you do that and you throw strikes with it, it makes it tough on the hitter, because you’re not sure what you’re going to get.

“He really showed an ability to pitch, and with a lot of different offerings.”

Hudson will serve as the opener for Chicago, as he did Friday night, when he worked around a hit and walk to notch a scoreless first inning.

Right-hander Sean Burke (1-2, 4.10 ERA) is expected to follow in bulk relief. Burke took a no-decision at Washington on Sept. 27, 2025, allowing two runs — on a Daylen Lile home run — and two hits in 4 1/3 innings with one walk and 10 strikeouts.

Burke has pitched to a 3.63 ERA in four April appearances, including three starts. He’s coming off Tuesday’s 11-5 victory in Arizona, when he spaced two runs and five hits in six innings with one walk and three strikeouts.

White Sox first baseman Munetaka Murakami is 1-for-8 with a solo home run and four strikeouts to begin the series.

Murakami has homered in six of his past eight games, but the 26-year-old rookie has four multi-strikeout games over the same span. He shares the major league lead of 11 home runs with Houston’s Yordan Alvarez.

–Field Level Media

What should have been a day to remember for Nathan Church turned into one he’d almost like to forget.

The St. Louis rookie outfielder hit two home runs and robbed another with a leaping catch at the wall, but he grounded into a game-ending double play as the Cardinals fell 11-9 to the visiting Seattle Mariners.

The Cardinals will attempt to avoid being swept in the three-game interleague series when it wraps up on Sunday afternoon.

“It was a good day for our offense, put up a lot of runs, but the outcome wasn’t what we wanted,” said Church, 25, who was summoned out of the dugout by the fans after his two-run homer in the seventh inning broke a 7-7l tie.

Church hit a solo shot in the second and added a sacrifice fly in a four-run third as the Cardinals took their first lead.

In the sixth, he made a leaping grab at the left-field wall to deny Seattle’s Mitch Garver of a homer.

“Really good day for him,” Cardinals manager Oliver Marmol said of Church, who was playing in his 50th major league game. “He just continues to play really good defense, and the two homers, man, his swing just keeps looking better and better and the confidence continues to grow, which is what he needs. Both sides of the ball starting to settle in. The path he took today … just the work going into what he’s doing is really positive.”

JJ Wetherholt, Ivan Herrera and Pedro Pages also went deep for the Cardinals, but it wasn’t enough as Julio Rodriguez, Will Wilson and Cole Young homered for the Mariners.

Leading 9-7 in the eighth, Marmol called on closer Riley O’Brien with runners on second and third and one out. Pinch hitter Connor Joe greeted O’Brien with a tying two-run single.

In the ninth, J.P. Crawford reached on a bunt single with one out, Garver walked, and Young was hit by a pitch to load the bases. Leo Rivas lined the next pitch up the middle to break a 9-9 deadlock.

“It was one of those days,” said O’Brien (3-1), a Seattle native. “I’ll try not to think about the game for a little bit, watch it (Sunday morning) and see what I can take away from it.”

Rivas broke out of a 5-for-44 slump.

“I feel like I’ve been hitting the ball good the last couple days but right at ’em,” he said. And to have that one (fall) in a good situation like that is like — oooof — a relief for me.”

The 11 runs and 19 hits were season highs for the Mariners, who have won three games in a row and five of their past seven.

“What we’ve been waiting for,” manager Dan Wilson said. “Our guys, we don’t panic. We just continue to put together good at-bats, try to crawl our way back in the game. And that’s what they did.”

Sunday’s series finale will feature a pair of right-handers in the Mariners’ Emerson Hancock (2-1, 2.83 ERA) against the Cardinals’ Michael McGreevy (1-2, 3.29).

Hancock didn’t get a decision Monday in a 6-4 loss to the visiting Athletics after giving up three runs on seven hits over five innings. He’s 1-0 with a 0.00 ERA in one career relief appearance against St. Louis.

McGreevy took a 5-3 loss Monday for the Cardinals at Miami when he allowed four runs in 5 2/3 innings. He’s 0-0 with a 1.50 ERA in one previous start vs. Seattle.

–Field Level Media