10 amazing things most fans don't know about new Cincinnati Reds pitcher Brent Suter.
A lot of baseball fans in Cincinnati know about local kid Brent Suter, the left-handed pitcher who has long resided in town but finally came home again in a baseball sense when he agreed to a free agent deal with the Reds on Thursday.
Suter, 34, was drafted in the 31st round by the Milwaukee Brewers out of college in 2012 and made his big-league debut with the Brewers in 2016, eventually making 39 starts and 157 relief appearances for Milwaukee until the Colorado Rockies claimed him off waivers before the 2023 season.
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Suter’s fans may know that he and his wife Erin have two young sons and a mini golden doodle named Wally.
Did you know this about new Red Brent Suter
He was born in Chicago and lived during childhood in Anaheim, California, and Atlanta before the family moved to Cincinnati in 1997, the summer he turned 8, with Cincinnati becoming his home since then, starring in basketball and baseball at Moeller along the way.
His dad, Mike, also played at Moeller and was a teammate of Barry Larkin’s there before going on to play football for Penn State, where Mike won a national championship in 1982.
Brent had the lowest ERA (3.38) on the Colorado Rockies staff last year for anybody with more than an inning pitched and didn’t give up a home run at Coors Field (141 batters faced).
He’s 4-0 with a 1.13 ERA in 13 career appearances (16 innings) at Great American Ball Park — without allowing a home run. That ERA is his best for any ballpark in which he made more than three appearances.
He hit one career home run before the advent of the universal DH, a first-pitch shot off the batter’s eye in center field at Milwaukee’s Miller Park in 2018 — off then-reigning American League Cy Young winner Corey Kluber.
Earned the nickname “Raptor” from minor-league teammate Tim Dillard because of his running gait during team sprints, and later used Jurassic Park-themed music for his walk-out song in the big leagues.
Pitched collegiately at Harvard, where he earned a degree in environmental science and public policy.
Suter and Reds pitcher Hunter Greene already are “teammates,” members of Players for the Planet, an organization of professional athletes dedicated to environmental preservation and restoration projects (such as beach cleanup in the Dominican Republic), co-founded by former Reds outfielder Chris Dickerson.
He’s recognized as one of MLB’s most talented impersonators, including spot-on imitations of movie characters Ron Burgundy, Ace Ventura and Forrest Gump.
After Wally kept swiping baby son Liam’s pacifiers and destroying them a few years ago, Brent wrote a children’s book titled The Binky Bandit — complete with an environmentally conscious message — which was eventually printed and distributed by a Milwaukee publisher in 2022.
This article originally appeared on Cincinnati Enquirer: 10 things you probably don't know about new Reds lefty Brent Suter.
