BY DAN GLICKMAN
ROCHESTER, N.Y. – Drew Millas is generally considered fast for a catcher. He’s stolen 39 bases in his minor league career, including 10 in 60 games for the Rochester Red Wings in 2024. He also swiped four bags in Washington during his 20-game stint with the big club last season. His manager, Matt LeCroy, says he’s among the best athletes behind the plate. Millas knows it, too, having once told Red Wings’ play-by-play man Josh Whetzel that he’s the fastest catcher in baseball. It’s an assessment he stands by.
“I am, I know that,” he said. “No other catcher trains on the track in the offseason [like] me, so I’m pretty confident in it.”
But hitting two triples, not to mention a home run as he dominated the Red Wings’ 10-1 home opener win over the Lehigh Valley IronPigs on Tuesday? And becoming the first Red Wing catcher in history to do so? That’s a new one. In fact, nobody had done it at the AAA or MLB level anywhere since Hall-of-Famer Ivan Rodriguez did so on May 12, 2000.
“I don’t think I’ve ever had two triples [in a game] in my life, that was pretty cool,” Millas said.
VIEW MORE PHOTOS FROM JOE TERRITO.
The 27-year-old Missourian opened Red Wings scoring in the bottom of the first. With men on second and first, the switch hitter blooped a high fly ball toward the right-field line. The slowly falling mortar shot of a hit fell just out of the reach of a diving Gabriel Rincones Jr. before rolling into the right field corner. Millas powered to third with the stand-up triple, while Robert Hassell III and Juan Yepez scored to give the Wings the early 2-0 lead.
Two innings later, Millas did it again. With the team now up 4-0, Millas came around on an 81.9 MPH slider from Lehigh starter Nabil Crismatt and sent it down into the corner of right field. As the ball rolled around the bottom edge of the wall, he again hustled to third, bringing home Franchy Cordero to extend the lead to 5-0.
“I wasn’t really thinking about it, to be honest,” he said of his triples post-game. “I was just running.”
The Missouri State alumnus put an exclamation mark on his day at the plate in the fifth, smacking the first pitch from Joel Kuehnel 96.3 miles per hour and 363 feet, landing firmly over the right field fence for his first home run of the year, a two-run shot to make it 8-1.
Ultimately, Millas ended the day 3-for-4 with the home run, the two triples, a walk, five RBI, and two runs scored.
Millas also caught an impressive North American debut for Japanese left-handed pitcher Shinnosuke Ogasawara. The import, who spent the last nine seasons with the Chunichi Dragons of Nippon Pro Baseball, threw six innings of five-hit ball, striking out six without allowing a walk in a 67 pitch outing.
“I was really happy about this opportunity to pitch in my first game of the season,” Ogasawara (1-0) said post-game through an interpreter. “I tried to pitch my way and in my style, and that’s what I tried to focus on.”
Count his manager as one person impressed by his outing.
“He pitched extremely well,” LeCroy said. “He had a rough go in spring training, but to see him come out here and do what he did with the baseball- he landed some curveballs, he got some swing-and-misses on the changeup. Most importantly, he was in the strike zone more than he was in spring training.”
“Hopefully he can build on that and get some confidence,” he said. “It kind of shows why [the Nationals] signed him and what he’s capable of.”
Millas and Ogasawara were hardly the only Red Wings making a big first impression for 2025 with the home crowd.
Center fielder Robert Hassell III went 3-for-5 with a double, an RBI, a stolen base, and two runs scored. Third baseman Brady House had two hits and two RBI, including a triple that found the gap in left-center just a few at-bats before Millas lined his second triple of the day. Former big leaguer Franchy Cordero, making his Innovative Field Red Wings debut, had three hits and an RBI.
The team’s performance came only after the usual opening day trappings. A band played, Red Wings leaders and local politicians gave speeches, and big special “2025 Opening Week” decals were painted on the field. And in what has become a Rochester tradition, Red Wings general manager Dan Mason noted that the temperature had again failed to meet his “guarantee” of 50 degrees, meaning everyone with opening day tickets would get free tickets to any game in April or May.
Lucas West, a Fairport native who sang the national anthem ahead of the Buffalo Bills’ victory over the Baltimore Ravens earlier this year, did so again, this time for Innovative Field. Dansville native Ryan Corbett, freed in January after 894 days in the custody of Afghanistan’s Taliban government, threw out the ceremonial first pitch to huge cheers from the small but passionate crowd of 4,220.
And then came the game, and the first win for the Red Wings in a home opener since 2016.
“A lot of good things happened,” said LeCroy. “And to win on opening day? It makes it a little bit sweeter.”
The Red Wings (2-1) continue their series with Lehigh Valley on Wednesday at 6:05 p.m. Korean right-hander Hyun-Il Choi is set to take the mound against IronPigs lefty Easton Lucas.
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