By Marc Lancaster - Post Staff
They loved Bronson Arroyo in Boston, and he loved them right back.
Though he certainly played a role in his team's on-field success, a healthy portion of the adoration the pitcher earned from Red Sox Nation could be attributed to his personality. A guitar-playing, bar-hopping regular guy, he was likable and easy to embrace.
Cincinnati may still come to appreciate those qualities, but Arroyo got a head start on the process Wednesday by excelling at his day job. On the way to defeating the Chicago Cubs 8-6, Arroyo pitched efficiently into the seventh inning and contributed his first professional home run to a typical longball extravaganza at Great American Ball Park.
It wasn't quite a shut-down performance by the Reds' new No. 2 starter, but his all-around game earned Arroyo a standing ovation from the crowd when he departed with two outs in the seventh. He responded by doffing his cap and was still smiling after the game.
"It's awesome," he said. "Any time you come to a new place, everybody likes to be accepted and wanted. To get off to a good start and have a good crowd reception when I came out of the game was great."
Arroyo allowed six hits and three earned runs (five total) in 6 2/3 innings, striking out seven without walking a batter. Of his 103 pitches, 75 were strikes. He had a couple of bumps in the road, namely the two-run homers he surrendered to Aramis Ramirez in the first and Derrek Lee in the sixth, but he was in control most of the way.
It was a showing reminiscent of his last spring training outing, a week ago against the Red Sox in Fort Myers. After Wednesday, it would appear that last week's effort wasn't merely the product of adrenaline.
"He's a pretty good pitcher," said Reds manager Jerry Narron. "After seeing him pitch in Fort Myers the other day, our guys had a lot of confidence in him. They'd heard a lot about him, and everybody knows he's pitched in big games. It's nice to have him in the middle of our rotation."
And, for one day at least, the batting order.
With the Reds trailing 2-1 going to the bottom of the third, everything was starting to fall into place for Arroyo. He had fanned three of the last four hitters he'd faced and stepped to the plate for his first at-bat of the season.
Down 0-2 against Cubs starter Glendon Rusch, Arroyo watched the lefty shake off to signs from catcher Michael Barrett and guessed a fastball was coming next. That's exactly what he got, and he deposited it 403 feet away in the left-field stands.
"He tried to come inside a little bit, and I just got lucky," said Arroyo.
It was his first home run since high school, where Arroyo last took his cuts in 1995. Forgive him if his trot around the bases was a little rusty.
"I came back to the dugout and guys were like, 'You pimped it - that was beautiful,'" he said. "I didn't even know what was going on. I was just floating around the bases out there."
Four batters later, Rich Aurilia went deep to give Arroyo a lead he wouldn't relinquish, though it got dicey for a few innings.
After Ronny Cedeno's two-out double to left in the seventh, the Cubs sent John Mabry to the plate as a pinch-hitter, down 7-4. Arroyo had just cleared the 100-pitch plateau, and he said he figured his day was finished.
"It was at that point of the game where you've done your job and there's no need, really, to try and push things," said Arroyo. "That's what your bullpen's there for. I'd given them what we needed, which was a chance to win."
Left-hander Kent Mercker got the call, and Mabry hammered his second pitch over the wall in center to make it a 7-6 game. But Mercker, Todd Coffey and David Weathers would retire the next seven Cubs hitters in a row to wrap up the win for Arroyo.
In only a couple of weeks, Arroyo's teammates have grown to appreciate how he "keeps it loose" both on and off the field, as Austin Kearns noted Wednesday.
There has been evidence that the fans are clued in, too. When Arroyo was introduced on Opening Day, he drew one of the biggest cheers from the assembled masses.
"I definitely noticed it," he said. "It just means that people are expecting, hopefully, big things from me. Hopefully I can come here and satisfy that need for us to have some quality pitching over here."
This article appears courtesy of The Cincinnati Post.
