Mario Soto’s rise with the early 1980s Reds feels sharper when you remember the club was drifting through a down period. The Big Red Machine was gone, the roster was thinning, and the city leaned hard on a right-hander from the Dominican Republic who pitched with a kind of stubborn fire. Soto wasn’t big, but his fastball and diving change drew quiet respect around the league. Cincinnati writers liked to note how he carried himself on days he pitched: calm voice, loose shoulders, almost serene until the first hitter stepped in.

By 1982 he had become the anchor of a staff that badly needed one, piling up strikeouts on a team that wasn’t giving him much support. Fans remember the way he worked quickly and held the ball low at his waist as if measuring the next pitch. Even when the Reds struggled, he was the constant presence, the player you tuned in for. In an era defined by transition, Soto gave Cincinnati a sense of identity when it didn’t have much else.