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Cards 7 Reds 3
The mix of poor defense and bad baserunning stirred with walks issued by your pitchers usually adds up to defeat. It resulted in a 7-3 defeat for the Reds vs the Cardinals Friday night night at Busch Stadium.
The Reds loaded the bases with no outs in the 9th but Max Schrock flew out, Jonathan India struck out and Brandon Drury flew out to the centerfield wall.
Failing at the basics: Nick Senzel and Kyle Farmer allowed a soft pop fly to drop untouched in shallow left-center field and it cost the Reds a run in the 1st inning. Two out baserunning confusion in the 3rd inning resulted in Joey Votto and Farmer both winding up at 3B and Farmer being tagged out. Instead of Votto potentially scoring on the Donovan Solano single, or the bases being loaded with two outs, the inning ended.
Walking on the wild side: Reds pitchers walked 8 batters.....after walking 8 Thursday night vs the Yankees.
Quick trouble: Both starters, Hunter Greene and Andre Pallante, allowed two runs in the first inning.
Hunter Greene: 5 IN, 5 H, 4 R, 3 BB, 6 K, HR, 106 pitches, 71 strikes. He threw 36 pitches and allowed two runs in the 1st inning that included two hits, two walks and two sacrifice flies. Nolan Gorman's 4th inning homer, the ML high 22nd allowed by Greene, broke a 3-3 tie.
Bullpen: 3 IN, 3 R, 5 BB. Trailing 4-3, Buck Farmer found 6th inning trouble w/ 2 H, 2 BB, R....he got bailed out of bigger trouble when Joel Kuhnel induced a DP. Ian Gibaut 2 H, 2 BB, 2 R in the 7th. Dauri Moreta 1.0 IN, 0 R.
Two out magic: Kyle Farmer lined a two-out, two run 1st inning single to put the Reds on the board 2-0. India had led off with a single and Drury followed with a double. The Reds forced Pallante to throw 27 pitches in the inning.
Run producer: Votto lined a RBI single against the shift to tied the game 3-3 in the 3rd. That's five RBI in his last three games.
Streaks: Drury extended his hit streak to eight games, India six games, Votto four games.
Nice play: Tyler Naquin cut down Brendan Donovan trying to stretch a single into a double (nice tag Farmer). That's 22 assists by the Reds outfield, tops in the NL.