Michael Lorenzen Doing His Impression Of Babe Ruth

THE baseball icon, Babe Ruth, was a record setting pitcher for the Boston Red Sox before being traded to the New York Yankees and becoming the most powerful hitter in baseball.

Michael Lorenzen was drafted by the Reds with the 38th pick in the Competitive Lottery phase of the 2013 draft, there was internal debate about whether the 26-year old from Anaheim, California would pitch or play the outfield.

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Lorenzen was the center fielder at Cal-State-Fullerton and hit .335 with seven home run, 53 RBI. He stole 12 bases.  He also had 19 saves in 22 appearances, often coming in from center field in save situations.  Lorenzen set a school record with 35 saves.

The Reds made him a much needed pitcher.  He pitched at four different levels in 2013 half-season action.  The next year he was promoted to Double A Pensacola and made 24 starts.  Lorenzen was a Southern League All-Star.  He was 4-6 with a 3.13 earned run average.

Lorenzen made his Major League debut on April 29. 2015 against the Milwaukee Brewers.  He singled off Matt Garza, who had been his first strikeout victim, in his first Major League at bat.

He honored his father, three days after his death, by hitting his first Major League home run off Pedro Baez on August 20.

Lorenzen pinch hit three times last season, hitting a home run in that role off Adam Morgan of Philadelphia on April 6.

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On Sunday, Lorenzen pinch hit against the Chicago Cubs and hit a home run off Mike Montgomery.  Lorenzen homered off Chase Anderson on Friday night in his last four plate appearances, Lorenzen has singled, homered twice and walked.

His ability to hit is valuable on a team with 13 pitchers and only four bench players, including a back-up catcher.

With position players being scarce would manager Jim Riggleman consider Lorenzen for the outfield.

"The reason I would do it was if  I wanted Lorenzen to pitch to the next hitter rather than the batter in the batter's box," Riggleman said.  "Whitey Herzog used to do it with Todd Worrell.  Whitey would bring Ken Daley in to pitch to Howard Johnson, who had Worrell's number kind of like (Eric) Thames has ours.  We're not there yet but Mike is the guy you would do it w"ith. You have to be confident that if the ball would be hit out there to him, he could handle it."

Riggleman joked that instead of making Lorenzen a fifth outfielder, he might make him third.

That's funny," was Lorenzen's reaction to the joke.  "I take great pride in the game of baseball.  Whatever that means, whether its base running, shagging fly balls, pitching or hitting. I love all aspects of the game.  I love playing it.  Baseball is so specialized now.  It's kind of a bummer, I'm up for whatever, if they want to move me to a position for a batter, like the Tampa Bay manager did, if that's going to put us in the best situation to win, I'm up for it.  Joe Maddon did it to us a couple years ago. That would be fun to do."