Let’s recap tonight’s titanic struggle….
FINAL
Cleveland 3
Cincinnati 1
W: F. Herrmann (1-0)
L: H. Bailey (3-3)
S: V. Pestano (1)
BOX SCORE
POSITIVES
–Joey Votto and Scott Rolen each had two hits. Votto hit his 12th homer — a ball he crushed to center field — and Rolen had two doubles.
–Homer Bailey pitched seven strong innings, giving up two earned runs on eight hits and a walk, striking out seven. Except for the bad pitch to Michael Brantley (a 3-run homer), he was really very good.
Your friend Milton will help you forget about baseball!
–One run. For an offense that ranks so highly, the Reds look lost at the plate far too often.
–Paul Janish made another error. He also made a bad mental error, arguing with an umpire when he could have thrown it to first to get Fausto Carmona out.
I campaigned for Janish to be the starter because I assumed he would provide elite defense. His defense has been pretty good this year, but not nearly good enough to make up for his pathetic bat.
NOT-SO-RANDOM THOUGHTS
–Yesterday, I said that I was sick of the Indians. Yeah…nothing has changed.
–Cincinnati has lost all five games against Cleveland this year. Not good.
–The good guys dropped back to .500, and now sit in fourth place, 3.5 games back of first. Even more depressing, the Reds are now a half-game behind the Pirates. The Pirates.
–This team is just frustrating this year. I still love ’em, but they are so very frustrating.
–The Reds have sold out each of the two games in this series, and I’m not sure they could lay more of an egg in front of the capacity crowds.
–Please, Mike Leake. Salvage something tomorrow.