Zach Buchanan

zbuchanan@enquirer.com

PITTSBURGH – This story was supposed to be about a managerial decision.

It should have focused on how Cincinnati Reds manager Bryan Price finally bucked conventional bullpen wisdom, how he went to one of his best relievers to quell a rally with no outs and the bases loaded in the third. How, by using right-hander Michael Lorenzen so far removed from the staid, rigid logic holding your top arms for the late innings, Price might have saved an eventual 7-1 win over the Pittsburgh Pirates on Monday at PNC Park.

But then Michael Lorenzen stood at his locker and calmly, matter-of-factly proclaimed himself nigh invincible.

“I work like the best, I have the stuff like the best,” Lorenzen said. “Why wouldn’t I think that what I’m doing is the best?”

Lorenzen says it not to brag, but to explain why he was so good when called upon Monday. So much of baseball is failure, but he’s done giving it any quarter. Doubt is a parasite, leeching from his capacity to reach potential, to be banished by sheer force of will.

When Price called down to the bullpen in the top of the third, Lorenzen was mentally ready. When Reds starter Brandon Finnegan loaded the bases and walked in a run on his 69th pitch, cutting the Cincinnati lead to 5-1 with no outs in the third, Lorenzen’s arm had caught up.

In 14 pitches, he calmly dissected the bottom third of the Pirates lineup. Josh Bell flew out to center, too shallow to score a run from third. Adam Frazier chopped a cutter back to the mound, allowing Lorenzen to get the force at home. Pitcher Wade LeBlanc whiffed on a 97 mph fastball. Jam resolved.

“I don’t try to not give up any runs,” Lorenzen said. “I know I’m not going to give up any runs.”

Price stuck with the 25-year-old for two more perfect frames. In the fourth, he finished off Jordy Mercer and Starling Marte on sliders that sliced out of the zone. Andrew McCutchen actually made hard contact, but Reds center fielder Billy Hamilton made a leaping catch at the wall.

Lorenzen got through the fifth on three groundouts. He needed eight pitches. He hit for himself to start the next half inning, but gave way to Cody Reed and Wandy Peralta, who turned in four perfect frames of their own to seal the game.

After the righty prepared as a reliever all spring, Price’s limit for Lorenzen was three. Lorenzen recognizes no such ceiling. After completing his second frame, he told pitching coach Mack Jenkins he was ready to finish the entire game.

“There’s no limit!” Lorenzen said after the game. “I don’t know why I would ever think there would be a limit on what I can do. It doesn’t make any sense for me to do that. It handicaps me as someone who’s trying to go out and perform with the best.”

The Reds have talked since the offseason about how much of a weapon Lorenzen could be out of the bullpen, and the creative ways they’d use him and fellow righty Raisel Iglesias. Monday was the first time Price actually tried something interesting beyond letting Lorenzen pinch-hit when he’s unavailable to pitch.

Lorenzen knows he’s a reliever and has embraced it, but that label represents just another limit to him. Price said after the game that no decision has been made on Lorenzen’s long-term future – “He’s a young man,” Price said – but Lorenzen wants to start eventually.

Actually, “wants” may not be strong enough.

“I will be back in the rotation one day,” he said. “When that time comes, I will capitalize on that opportunity and I will take advantage of it. I will run with it and never look back.”