‘He Finally Said It!’ – Gavin Lux Echoes Reds Nation’s Fury After Speedway Disaster

Winning tends to make everything easier to accept, and perhaps Gavin Lux would’ve felt differently if the Cincinnati Reds had come out on top Sunday. Instead, the Reds dropped the Speedway Classic to the Atlanta Braves, 4-2. After the game, Lux voiced what many Reds fans were already thinking — Major League Baseball mishandled the situation.

“Honestly, I think, looking at the radar, all we had to do was wait another hour,” Lux said. “We could have been fine and we don’t have to burn Chase. Honestly, I think it was poorly handled by the MLB.”

Lux was referring to Saturday night’s rain-delayed game, which was halted for 2 hours and 17 minutes before MLB officials opted to resume play — despite continued rain in the forecast. Reds starter Chase Burns took the mound for the top of the first, but worsening weather forced a stoppage in the bottom of the inning, and the game was suspended, pushing its conclusion to Sunday.

Gavin Lux just said what every Reds fan was thinking after Speedway Classic disaster

When the game resumed Sunday afternoon, the Reds couldn’t send Chase Burns back to the mound and had to pivot to lefty reliever Brent Suter. That decision effectively cost them over 80 pitches from their starting pitcher, forcing Cincinnati to rely on five different relievers to get through the remainder of the game.

While the Reds managed to avoid using top bullpen arms like Nick Martinez, Emilio Pagán, and Tony Santillan, they still came up short and dropped another crucial game — falling four back of the San Diego Padres in the Wild Card race.

Stripping a team of a home game in the middle of a playoff push is already questionable, but the stop-and-start handling of this event only further proves that showcase games like this should be treated as exhibitions — not official regular-season matchups.

The Reds lost a valuable off-day, had to scramble their travel plans to Chicago, and stretched an already worn-out bullpen all for the sake of MLB trying to break an attendance record by staging a game in Tennessee. Lux had every reason to be frustrated — MLB fumbled this badly.