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CINCINNATI, OHIO - MAY 23: Blake Dunn #59 of the Cincinnati Reds watches his single during game one of a doubleheader against the St. Louis Cardinals at Great American Ball Park on May 23, 2026 in Cincinnati, Ohio. (Photo by Jeff Dean/Getty Images) | Getty Images
It’s difficult to truly justify a game as a ‘must-win’ just 60 games into a 162 game MLB season, but Tuesday evening in Great American Ball Park began to feel like one shortly after its start.
The Cincinnati Reds, losers of 4 of their last 5 games, were sitting perilously close to being just .500 on the season despite their roaring start in April. They’d lost star Elly De La Cruz to the injured list with a hamstring injury that will sideline him for perhaps a month, and that’s on top of them losing half their rotation options and three of their back-of-the-bullpen stalwarts.
Things, for the Reds, had not been looking up. So when Kansas City Royals starter Noah Cameron began flirting with a perfect game through the first third of the game, the rest of the 2026 season sure felt like a bag of cold mush. Fortunately for the Reds, Spencer Steer swooped in from the rafters and put a hurtin’ on a pair of balls, chased Cameron, and helped pick the Reds up off the mat for at least one night.
Steer homered twice, Will Benson stepped in with the game-tying homer in the Bottom of the 9th, and the Reds managed to make it to extra innings in a 3-3 game despite their only three hits of the game (to that point) having come as solo dingers. And after Brock Burke managed to keep the Royals off the board in the Top of the 10th, it was Blake Dunn’s single into CF who scored – who else? – Steer to give the Reds an emotional 4-3 walk-off victory to level the series.
These Reds are an imperfect team. They were imperfect before the spate of injuries that has forced the re-shape of their entire roster. Still, they are a team with some latent talent, and it’s on Terry Francona to pull the strings at the right times in the right moments to make sure they maximize what it is they do have. On Tuesday night in GABP, that happened – albeit late – and the Reds walked away with a 4-3 win in a game that, for the longest time, they had zero business winning.
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