CINCINNATI -- Martín Prado has played more than twice as many games at third base -- 771 -- as at any other position in his 14-plus-season career, but that doesn’t mean he can pick up where he left off last year.

Prado, 35, was in Miami’s starting lineup at third base against Cincinnati at Great American Ball Park on Wednesday for the first time this season. The appearance at the hot corner was his first since last Aug. 13, and he was on the field hours before first pitch trying to make up for lost time by taking ground balls.

The work seemed to pay off when Prado made a diving stop of Eugenio Suarez’s sharp grounder and threw him out to end the fifth.

“It’s not like riding a bike,” he said between the workout and batting practice. “You have to be aware of a lot of stuff. That’s why I was taking ground balls, and I’ll take more during live batting practice. You don’t have much time to react down there. Some balls are hit really hard, and you don’t have much time to react. You have to get your footwork down. It’s not easy.”

Prado was starting in place of the slumping Brian Anderson, who went 0-for-4 with two strikeouts on Tuesday to extend his slump to 1-for-14. He hit .143 while playing in all 11 of Miami’s games. Manager Don Mattingly, who said before Tuesday’s game that he wasn’t too worried because he thought Anderson was having good at-bats with no reward, described Wednesday as “just a day to watch.”

“I told him I just wanted him to watch,” Mattingly said. “I want him to take a little break.”

Besides the refresher course on playing third base, Prado also has had to adjust to the ever-increasing use of infield shifts, many of which find the third baseman playing near second. That’s not totally foreign for him. His 273 games at second base are his second most at any position.

“They’ve been using shifts more and more the past two years,” he said. “That’s part of the process, moving back and forth. It’s all about adapting yourself to the process.”

Prado anticipated his instincts kicking in once he’d worked out the kinks with his pregame effort.

“I was just catching and throwing,” he said. “I’m trying not to think about it too much.”