GOODYEAR, Ariz. \u2014 When he thinks of Eugenio Su\u00e1rez, the first thing that comes to mind for Arizona Diamondbacks manager Torey Lovullo is the silence. <\/p>\n
\u201cWhen he stands up in front of the room and has a conversation with the group, nobody responds and nobody talks but him,\u201d Lovullo said. \u201cYou know that he\u2019s commanding the room and has earned their respect. He did that on a few occasions. He said something \u2014 it was almost like he slammed the gavel down \u2014 and now we go execute it. It\u2019s very motivating.\u201d<\/p>\n
When Seattle Mariners manager Dan Wilson thinks of Eugenio Su\u00e1rez, he remembers the noise.<\/p>\n
Su\u00e1rez played for the Mariners in 2022 and 2023 and then got traded to the Diamondbacks heading into the 2024 season. Then at the trade deadline in 2025, the Mariners traded to get Su\u00e1rez back. Due to a logistical coincidence, Su\u00e1rez and the Mariners were both in Sacramento at the time of the trade.<\/p>\n
So Su\u00e1rez literally met the Mariners on the tarmac and boarded the Mariners\u2019 team plane. The group went crazy as he stepped on board.<\/p>\n
\u201cWhen he came back to our team last year, the reception that he got on the airplane and some of the relationships he renewed, it was super impactful,\u201d Wilson said. \u201cI don\u2019t know how to describe it other than that he\u2019s an incredible human and an incredible player. Any team is lucky to have him.\u201d<\/p>\n
Su\u00e1rez is beloved in every clubhouse that he has been a part of. In Seattle, he was the \u201cgood vibes\u201d guy on a team that included superstars like Julio Rodriguez and Cal Raleigh. In Arizona, Su\u00e1rez was far-and-away the most experienced veteran position player in the clubhouse.<\/p>\n
That\u2019s the role that Su\u00e1rez is stepping back into in Cincinnati. The 34-year-old has the opportunity to set the tone with his energy, and to take young guys like Elly De La Cruz, Noelvi Marte and Sal Stewart under his wing.<\/p>\n
\u201cI came here to help the team win games and be the best version of the Cincinnati Reds,\u201d Su\u00e1rez said. \u201cI want to be one of the guys who helps the young kids be better on and off the field. It\u2019s not just physical. It\u2019s more about mentally. You have to be strong up here, and that helps you be your best version on the field.\u201d<\/p>\n
The Reds got better during the offseason, and Su\u00e1rez was the biggest addition. But the team did lose a few of its best and most vocal veteran leaders from the 2025 team, including Nick Martinez, Brent Suter and Gavin Lux.<\/p>\n
The longest-tenured Reds, including TJ Friedl, Tyler Stephenson and Hunter Greene, were rookies and were prospects during Eugenio Su\u00e1rez\u2019s first stint with the Reds. They know what he brings to the table. So do the guys who hadn\u2019t met him until last Tuesday.<\/p>\n
\u201cWhen I think of him, I think of all of the good things I\u2019ve heard about him as a person,\u201d Spencer Steer said. \u201cHis ability to mesh well with the clubhouse, that\u2019s what you hear about a guy like that. I\u2019m excited to get to know the guy and have him around on a daily basis. The things you can learn from him and the questions you can ask him, those are the things that I think of. Then, obviously, you have a guy who can hit 50 homers.\u201d<\/p>\n
It helps that Su\u00e1rez is a great guy, but the Reds brought him here primarily to hit. For years, going back to the end of Joey Votto\u2019s prime in 2021, they\u2019ve been missing that consistent slugging presence in the middle of their lineup. As a result, pitchers haven\u2019t had to throw many strikes to Elly De La Cruz.<\/p>\n
In 2025, the Reds had a lot of problems coming back late in games and winning games in extra innings. Big swings from Su\u00e1rez in those moments will go a long way.<\/p>\n
\u201cAny time you can add 49 homers and over 100 RBIs, it\u2019s a big deal,\u201d Pag\u00e1n said. \u201cIn those close games, it always seems to be one big swing or one play that decides the game. A guy who can leave the yard as many times as he does, you have a chance to win those close games more.\u201d<\/p>\n
Having Su\u00e1rez in the lineup takes pressure off of De La Cruz, even when Su\u00e1rez is cold. Last year, Terry Francona was mixing and matching in the cleanup spot all year. Because of what\u2019s on the back of Su\u00e1rez\u2019s baseball card, Francona says he won\u2019t have to move Su\u00e1rez down in the lineup when Su\u00e1rez is slumping.<\/p>\n
Even when Su\u00e1rez is in a slump, pitchers still worry about him. Because of Su\u00e1rez\u2019s proven elite raw power, pitchers will always have to think twice about throwing Su\u00e1rez pitches over the middle of the plate.<\/p>\n
\u201cThat\u2019s a lot of thump,\u201d Jose Trevino said. \u201cI remember in one of my first spring trainings, I was facing the Reds. He hit a ball in Goodyear to right-center and it cleared the right-center berm. It was a missile. Woah. That\u2019s pretty special. That guy has special pop.\u201d<\/p>\n
While Su\u00e1rez is one of the best sluggers in MLB, he\u2019s still a relatively one-dimensional hitter. There\u2019s a reason why after hitting 49 homers in 2025, the Reds were able to land him on a one-year deal. In 2025, he hit .228 and got on base under 30% of the time. He\u2019s one of the most strikeout-prone hitters in baseball. He\u2019s also one of the streakiest hitter in MLB.<\/p>\n
In 2021, his final year in Cincinnati before the Reds traded him, Su\u00e1rez had the 19th-worst OPS in MLB among qualifying hitters. But then in 2022, with the Mariners, Su\u00e1rez turned it around. He was solid during the first four months of the season, and he then exploded in August (.947 OPS) and September (.831 OPS).<\/p>\n
Su\u00e1rez took a step back in 2023, but in that down season he still had a terrific two-month stretch between July and August. He hit 14 of his 22 homers in 2023 after July 1.<\/p>\n
Then in 2024, after joining the Diamondbacks, Su\u00e1rez was bad through the first half of the season (.668 OPS). He started losing playing time. According to reports out of Arizona, the front office was considering the possibility of designating Su\u00e1rez for assignment.<\/p>\n
\u201cI could see the game was weighing him down,\u201d Lovullo said. <\/p>\n
The manager called Su\u00e1rez in for a meeting. <\/p>\n
\u201cI don\u2019t want to have the next level of conversation with you,\u201d Lovullo told him. \u201cHave you gone through your checklist to make sure you\u2019re as ready as you can possible be every single day? Do you have a routine? Is it a high-intensity routine?\u201d<\/p>\n
Lovullo felt like during afternoon workouts before games, Su\u00e1rez was always trying to preserve energy for the games. He felt like Su\u00e1rez was \u201cmethodically\u201d going through his warmups. So they came up with a new seven-day workout routine where Su\u00e1rez would do this every Monday, that every Tuesday, etc.<\/p>\n
\u201cThe real turnaround for him was hitting off of the velocity machine and Traject,\u201d Lovullo said.<\/p>\n
Traject is a new-school, advanced pitching machine that replicates specific pitches of any pitcher in the game. Facing the Traject machine is as close to live at-bats as you can get.<\/p>\n
\u201cOnce he started to catch up to the velocity, it was almost an instant turnaround,\u201d Lovullo said. \u201cFrom the time I had that conversation, within a week, I could see there was a lot of progress. He deserves all of the credit for trusting the information he had an applying it.\u201d<\/p>\n
In 2024, Su\u00e1rez posted a 1.131 OPS in July. He wasn\u2019t quite as hot in August (.782 OPS). But then in September, Su\u00e1rez posted a 1.029 OPS. He hit 24 of his 30 homers in 2024 after July 1.<\/p>\n
Lovullo said that you can tell when Su\u00e1rez is on the verge of getting red hot.<\/p>\n
\u201cWhen he\u2019s laying off of certain pitches, checking off of pitches that are undrivable, fouling off good two-strike pitches, that\u2019s what I know good things are happening,\u201d Lovullo said.<\/p>\n
There was also a movement that Lovullo looked for. As he explains it, Lovullo gets into a batting stance and acts it out.<\/p>\n
\u201cHe checks off his swing where it\u2019s a yes, yes, yes and at the last second his entire body moves but his hands stay back (to take the pitch), Lovullo said. \u201cWhen I see a yes, yes, no decision that late, I know good things are on the way.\u201d<\/p>\n
The momentum that Su\u00e1rez generated during the second half of the 2024 season carried through the first half of the 2025 season as Su\u00e1rez carried a .889 OPS and 31 homers into the All-Star game. He was a hot commodity at the deadline, and Wilson said the Mariners trading for Su\u00e1rez gave the team a jolt.<\/p>\n
\u201cHe has a big heart, and he wants to win,\u201d Wilson said. \u201cHe\u2019s the same guy every day. That\u2019s his superpower. You can\u2019t tell if he\u2019s going well or he\u2019s not going well. Baseball likes consistency, so people are just drawn to him. He\u2019s just so consistent.\u201d<\/p>\n
During the second half of the season, Su\u00e1rez really cooled off. After the All-Star break, he hit .196 with a .729 OPS and struck out nearly 1.5 times per game on average. His slump carried through the ALDS, where he hit .095 with one extra-base hit in the five-game series victory for the Mariners over the Tigers.<\/p>\n
Su\u00e1rez stayed steady, and he turned it around. He recorded a hit in every game of the seven-game ACLS against the Blue Jays. In Game 5, with the series tied at two games apiece, Su\u00e1rez was the hero as he had a two-homer game in a 6-2 win. His grand slam in the bottom of the eighth was the difference.<\/p>\n
The Blue Jays won the final two games of the series to advance to the World Series, but Su\u00e1rez\u2019s Game 5 will always be remembered in Seattle.<\/p>\n
\u201cHe keeps fighting,\u201d Wilson said. \u201cHe got to a really big moment for us in the playoffs and delivered in a big way. That\u2019s because he keeps pushing on and doesn\u2019t let (a slump) bother him\u201d<\/p>\n
The Reds hope that Su\u00e1rez can help push the team over the top in that type of moment in the playoffs in 2026.<\/p>\n
\u201cHe gives everybody a jolt,\u201d Francona said. \u201cMyself included. There\u2019s certainly a presence in the lineup. There\u2019s a presence with him and the way he carries himself.\u201d<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"GOODYEAR, Ariz. \u2014 When he thinks of Eugenio Su\u00e1rez, the first thing that comes to mind for Arizona…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":466715,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[65],"tags":[363,99],"class_list":["post-466714","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-mlb","tag-mlb","tag-sports"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/466714","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=466714"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/466714\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/466715"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=466714"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=466714"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=466714"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}