A team strapped for meaningful and sustained offensive production is going to be hard-pressed to find any against Zack Greinke.
Even when the struggling Reds did something Tuesday night that no opponent has done against the Dodgers starter since last summer — score more than two earned runs — it was still was nowhere near enough.
Greinke struck out 11 over 7 2/3 innings while Alfredo Simon was roughed up and pulled early during a 6-3 setback at Dodger Stadium. The Reds have lost a season-high four in a row. With a 22-28 record, they are also a season-high six games under .500.
“He’s a very good pitcher,” Reds manager Bryan Price said of Greinke. “[But] we just weren’t in the position where we could give up a bulk of runs. We did. They had a big inning. Against him when he’s on, it’s a knockout blow.”
Dodgers pitchers combined for 14 strikeouts without walking a batter. The only glimmer of good news for Cincinnati’s lineup was it ended Greinke’s streak of 22 straight starts in which he allowed two or fewer earned runs, dating back to July 30 of last season.
The bad news was that Greinke had long since had a commanding lead when Devin Mesoraco hit a two-run home run with two outs in the eighth inning.
Much of the Dodgers’ damage can be credited to Andre Ethier and his four RBIs. Ethier gave the Dodgers a 1-0 lead against Simon when he hit a two-out first pitch over the fence in right-center field for his third homer of the season.
In the bottom of the fourth, Carl Crawford scorched a ball off first baseman Donald Lutz’s glove for a single, and Yasiel Puig followed with a single up the middle. With one out and a three-ball count, Simon intentionally walked Adrian Gonzalez to face Ethier with the bases loaded.
Ethier lined a triple to the right-field corner that made it a 4-0 game. Simon would issue two more walks and another hit before being pulled with two outs for Logan Ondrusek.
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