Matt McLain & the Reds Arizona Fall League contingent begin play today

And you can watch!

I’ve got an almost four year old and a sixteen month knee-high running around the house these days, and it has admittedly become a lot more difficult for me to keep up with relative lengths of time. Time flies while taking forever most days, and the parents out there reading this know what I mean.

Matt McLain last played a big league baseball game on August 27th of last year. To me, that runs through my ears as the last time Matt McLain played a baseball game you were still having to swaddle Lucy and sleep shifts on the chair in the nursery. That was both one minute and an entire lifetime ago, I believe.

McLain and his Glendale Desert Dog teammates begin their Arizona Fall League campaign today, however, and for the first time in both a minute and an entire lifetime you’ll be able to watch him play ball. He’ll be joined by the likes of Christian Encarnacion-Strand, Edwin Arroyo, Connor Phillips, & Co. as the Reds lean hard into their ability to use this AFL as something of a rehab stint for many of their big name, promising youngsters.

In what surely is no coincidence, Matt’s brother Sean - a former 5th round pick out of Arizona State and Los Angeles Dodgers farmhand - is also on Glendale’s roster this year.

The Desert Dogs will take on the Peoria Javelinas in today’s lid-lifter, with first pitch set for 3:30 PM ET. There’s supposed to be a live stream of most every AFL game this year via MLB.com, if I’m reading things correctly, and you should be able to track down today’s stream (and future ones) here.

You can find the full Glendale roster here, too, including all the Reds prospects who are on it that I didn’t previously mention.