Rus Livingood
June 21, 2013 – Reds @ Diamondbacks – 9:40pm – Fox Sports Ohio
Reds Record (44 – 30)
Away Record (18 – 16)
Diamondbacks Record (39 – 33)
Home Record (19– 15)
Starters: Miley (4 – 6) vs. Cueto (4 – 0)
The Setting: 9:40pm? Yeah, I’m not going to be able to stay up for the conclusion of this game. Gone are the days when I am up past midnight on a Friday night. I’mstarting the game on my recliner, but I’ll probably be in bed watching the games as I fall asleep after a few innings.
The Game and Analysis:
•Maybe it was best that I fell asleep during the game. It was 6 – 3 Diamondbacks when I nodded off, and the score changed every time I would wake up. The Diamondbacks offense broke out in a big way, crushing Johnny Cueto and the Reds 11 – 5 in the first game of the series.
•Cueto was hit early and often, and it started with Gerardo Parra’s home run to start the bottom of the first inning. Cueto would give up 7 runs, all earned, as the Diamondbacks got 11 hits off the Reds ace. Cueto left with one out in the fifth inning, trailing 5 – 3. He had thrown 96 pitches and did not look good at all. He was leaving balls up in the zone, and got behind in the count often. He threw first pitch strikes to only 13 of the 24 batters he faced. His ERA jumped from 2.08 to 3.21 with the bad outing.
•With the Reds down 3 – 0, Jay Bruce got the Reds on the board with another home run. His only hit of the game, the blast made Bruce’s last five hits home runs. As I stated a few times over the last few games, Bruce doesn’t seem to be locked into a hot streak, he is just connecting on one pitch every game. This shot was against another lefty, and Bruce continues to show great improvement against lefthanders.
•Joey Votto hit an RBI double down the left field line to close the gap to 3 – 2 in the fifth inning. He would later add a solo homer in the seventh, and went 3 – 4 overall. Votto has raised his average back up to .330 after slumping recently, getting multiple hits in five of his last six games. Over that span, he is hitting .500 (12 – 24).
•Three Diamondbacks picked up at least three hits: Paul Goldschmit (3), Jason Kubel (4), and former Red prospect Didi Gregorius (3). Goldschmidt Crushed two homers, and increased his National League-leading RBI total to 65. Six Arizona players had RBIs in the game, and the team went 4 – 8 with runners in scoring position.
•Reliever Curtis Partch had a rough outing, giving up four runs on three hits and two walks in his one inning of work.
•The Reds chased starting pitcher Wade Miley out of the game before he pitched five innings, so he did not get the win for the Diamondbacks. He was taken out with two outs in the fifth with runners on and the score tied. Had he been able to get out of the jam, his team’s offensive explosion in the bottom of the fifth would have made him the pitcher of record. I guess the Reds can claim a small moral victory in an otherwise lousy game.
•My internal clock for sleep kicked in as the Diamondbacks were pulling away from the Reds in the fifth, and when I later woke up on the couch to see it was 11 – 3, I was thoroughly unimpressed. By the time I got upstairs and turned the game on, it was 11 – 4 as I totally missed Votto’s homer. I also fell back asleep before the Reds got their final run on a Devin Mesoraco RBI single in the ninth. Nothing seemingly went right for old Rus in this viewing experience.
What Worked: Uh. . .
What Didn’t Work: Cueto got blasted like nothing I can remember in recent memory. Partch got lit up as well.
Where They Stand: The Reds are 44 – 31 and trail the Cardinals by 4.0 games in the NL Central. They trail the Pirates by 0.5 game, as the Reds fall to third place in their division.
Up Next: Game two of the series is tomorrow night on Fox. Ugh.
