The Reds may be heading toward a six-man starting rotation just as Chase Burns closes in on a heavy workload, with Rhett Lowder set to begin a rehab assignment perhaps as soon as next week. Terry Francona said the club is keeping its options open as it tries to manage Burns without turning the conversation into a strict innings cap.
That matters now because Burns has been Cincinnati’s ace this season and, in many years, would be in the thick of the NL Cy Young race. He also could pick up some down-ballot support this year, even if an impending innings limit makes it hard to imagine him finishing among the finalists. Jeff Brantley brought up that possibility during a recent broadcast, and Francona addressed it before the Reds’ series finale against the New York Mets.
Francona said he would be open to listening to the trainers and DJ when it comes to pitcher usage. He added that pitchers usually show when they need a blow, whether through a loss of range of motion or a delivery that starts to dip, and said analytics now make those signs easier to track. In his view, how a pitcher is holding up matters more than a hard pitch count or a hard innings limit.
That leaves Burns in a familiar spot for a young frontline starter. If he keeps working six innings per start, he could be close to 150 innings by the end of July, even though he has thrown less than 110 innings in 2025. It is difficult to see him going much past 140 innings this season, which is why the Reds are already thinking about how to cover the rest of the schedule without asking too much of him.
Lowder’s return could be the piece that gives Cincinnati that flexibility. The Reds were considering a six-man alignment at the outset of the season before Nick Lodolo landed on the injured list, and Lowder’s rehab assignment could put that idea back on the table. The open question is whether the club actually makes the move once he is ready, or keeps leaning on its current pattern and lets Burns’ innings load decide the rest.
For now, the Reds are trying to balance two truths at once: Burns has been good enough to talk about like a Cy Young candidate, and his workload is moving toward a point where the team may need another starter to keep him available for the stretch run. The next step is Lowder’s rehab work next week, and that will tell the Reds how close they are to changing the shape of their rotation.
Related reading: Chase Burns hält die Reds in Philadelphia auf Kurs nach bösem Treffer
