Mike Leake has been pitching with neck stiffness since his May 25 start against the Cardinals. But the right-hander isn’t using that as an excuse for his worst outing of the season, which came in the Reds’ series finale against the Giants on Thursday afternoon.
Leake gave up a season-high five runs on eight hits over five innings, and San Francisco starter Madison Bumgarner thwarted Cincinnati’s offense as the Reds dropped their second consecutive game and the series, 6-1, at Great American Ball Park.
Coming into the contest, Leake held the seventh-longest active streak in the Majors by not having surrendered a home run in 45 2/3 innings dating back to April 26. That all changed when Michael Morse connected for his second homer in as many games, a 428-foot smash into the second deck in left field to give the Giants a 2-1 lead in the second.
Following singles by Pablo Sandoval and Tyler Colvin in the fourth, Leake gave up another home run, this time a 387-foot shot to right-center by Brandon Crawford, which made it 5-1.
“Truth be told, ever since the Cardinals start he’s been battling with some stiffness in his neck,” Reds manager Bryan Price said. “So he hasn’t been able to get that head turned all the way to the catcher’s glove. … He just wasn’t executing to the same degree today. … I got him out of there because it didn’t seem like things were going to get any better.”
Leake had been 4-0 with a 0.92 ERA in his prior four starts against San Francisco before getting roughed up in his shortest outing of the season. He said that the stiff neck wasn’t the cause of his problems, just poor pitch location.
“I’d just say that last little extension is tough to get [because of the neck stiffness],” Leake said. “But I’m still able to throw balls where I want to for the most part, and today it was just the first game I think I haven’t been able to. The neck was fine today; there weren’t any issues.”
Price knew Leake might downplay the neck issue, but said he had to take the right-hander out of his previous two starts because of it.
“We’ve needed him to pitch and he’s comfortable to pitch, but he’s not 100 percent, by any means,” Price said. “He may make nothing of it and that’s the type of kid he is, but we’ve taken him out, I think, the two previous starts because of it, just because it got to the point where it really stiffened up.”
The Giants added a run in the seventh, when Buster Posey grounded an RBI single into left against Reds reliever Sean Marshall to extend San Francisco’s lead to 6-1.
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