Saturday, the Reds introduced uniforms that were supposed to point toward the bright future of the organization. Monday, one of the players of the future will put on a Reds uniform for the team’s road game against the Colorado Rockies.

The Reds are calling up shortstop Matt McLain and will announce the move on Monday, The Athletic has confirmed with multiple team sources. The Cincinnati Enquirer first reported the news.

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McLain, 23, was the organization’s first-round pick in the 2021 draft and is the first of a heralded group of shortstop prospects in the Reds’ system to be called up, ahead of Elly De La Cruz, Noelvi Marte and Edwin Arroyo.

When he joins the Reds, McLain will play shortstop on most days, according to sources not authorized to speak publicly, while playing some second base when Jonathan India gets the day off or serves as the team’s DH.

In 38 games at Triple-A Louisville, McLain hit .348/.474/.710 with 12 home runs and 40 RBI. He also stole 10 bases and was caught five times. He struck out 34 times and walked 29 times in 173 plate appearances.

“The thing that’s impressive to me is that he takes his walks. He doesn’t chase a lot of balls out of the zone,” Louisville Bats manager Pat Kelly said Friday. “That’s the sign, to me, of a mature hitter. And if they make that mistake, he pops it. And for a guy that’s not very big in stature, he’s got a lot of juice in that bat. And it’s really fun to watch.”

Friday, Reds general manager Nick Krall was at the game in Louisville, as were Rob Coughlin, the team’s senior director of professional scouting, and special assistant Eric Davis.

McLain arrives following a 10-game hitting streak with the Bats, one that started on May 4 in Omaha when he hit for the cycle. He homered in three straight games last week and has reached base in 13 straight games.

McLain had a rough first full season in professional baseball in 2022 after the organization started him in Double A. He dealt with a wrist injury that caused him to miss about a month last June and July, but he finished the season healthy, playing in 103 games. He hit .232/.363/.453 with 17 home runs and 27 stolen bases in 103 games and 452 plate appearances last year.

After that rough debut, McLain worked in the offseason to adjust his swing, letting the ball come in further and using the opposite field more. He saw success in spring training and to this point in Triple A, a new level for him.

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McLain manned shortstop until late April when top prospect Elly De La Cruz was activated from the injured list. Once De La Cruz joined the Bats, McLain and De La Cruz split time at shortstop. On days when McLain was at shortstop, De La Cruz would play third base. With De La Cruz at shortstop, McLain would play second. It was the same setup the two shared last season when De La Cruz was promoted to Double A.

Although he has played mostly shortstop, McLain does have six errors at the position in 24 games this season.

“I think he probably defensively needs a little more work at shortstop than second base which is interesting because he’s been a shortstop most of his career,” Kelly said Friday. “I think the professional game is different. It’s a little bit faster and the game speeds up sometimes. We have a lot of work to do defensively as a shortstop, I think second base, he’s got a pretty good idea right now what he’s doing.”

McLain, who is not currently on the 40-man roster, will get most of his playing time over Jose Barrero, a former top prospect himself. Barrero, 25, was called up in 2020 but has struggled since getting to the big leagues. He is hitting .223/.288/.330 with a home run. He has 30 strikeouts and nine walks in 104 plate appearances.

Kevin Newman, 29, is hitting .237/.273/.323 with two home runs, 10 strikeouts and four walks in 99 plate appearances. Newman, a former Gold Glove finalist, was acquired in a trade with the Pirates last winter after the Reds traded Kyle Farmer to Minnesota.

Neither Newman nor Barrero has impressed defensively at shortstop this season. Barrero has also played center field, a position that could have an opening with Nick Senzel playing well at third base and TJ Friedl currently dealing with an oblique injury.

Newman has played second and third base.

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McLain, though, is the first of a large group of prospects the Reds have coming. Also at Triple A are De La Cruz, corner infielder Christian Encarnacion-Strand and left-hander Andrew Abbott.

Before the season, The Athletic’s Keith Law ranked McLain the team’s seventh-best prospect, behind three other shortstops — De La Cruz, Marte and Arroyo.

McLain is the oldest of that group. De La Cruz and Marte are 21 and Arroyo is 19. Of the four, Arroyo is the one considered to be a lock to stay at shortstop, but he is also the furthest away, currently hitting .196/.241/.343 at High-A Dayton.

De La Cruz has 28 strikeouts and 12 walks in 103 plate appearances at Louisville this year, but a week ago he had just two walks and 24 strikeouts. He struck out just four times in the six-game series against Columbus, but had two three-walk games and a pair of two-walk games, including a walk-off walk in Tuesday’s game that also saw him hit home runs from both sides of the plate, plus a double that had the highest exit velocity (118.8) of any batted ball in the big leagues or Triple A this season.

Encarnacion-Strand has walked less often than De La Cruz, just twice in 89 plate appearances, while striking out 23 times. He does have nine home runs and 12 extra-base hits in 19 games, though.

The Reds could also welcome Abbott to the big leagues soon. Currently, the team has just three healthy starters in the rotation after lefty Nick Lodolo was placed on the IL Saturday and Luis Cessa was designated for assignment and subsequently released last week.

Abbott started the season at Double-A Chattanooga and has made seven starts across the two levels. He was promoted after thoroughly dominating Double-A batters in three starts, going 1-0 with a 1.15 ERA. He struck out 36 and walked three in 15.2 innings with the Lookouts. In four starts with the Bats, he’s gone 1-0 with a 4.50 ERA. He’s struck out 29 batters and walked seven in 20 innings. In Double A, he used MLB’s experimental pre-tacked ball, while he’s made two starts with the full automatic ball-strike system in Triple-A and two with an umpire making the calls.

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McLain is the first of the team’s top prospects to get the call this year, but with how the players on the Bats are performing, he is unlikely to be the last.

(Photo of McLain: Brad Krause / Four Seam Images via AP)