It wasn’t raining runs for the Reds on Tuesday night vs. the D-backs, but they didn’t need the deluge — just more than the slow trickle of offense they’ve gotten lately.
After losing nine of the previous 10 games, the Reds got a much needed 3-0 victory over Arizona. In the process, they exorcised some offensive demons.
- Cincinnati snapped a five-game stretch where it scored two runs or fewer, including one run scored four times.
- The Reds had more than a one-run lead in this game for the first time since the All-Star break.
- Billy Hamilton snapped a career-high 0-for-15 skid with a leadoff double in the first inning and scored the game’s first run — and his first since Friday. Against D-backs starter Trevor Cahill, now 1-8 with a 5.59 ERA, Hamilton’s double to left field got the offense started on the right foot. He scored on Todd Frazier’s lined single to left field for a 1-0 lead.
- It was also the first time the Reds scored in the first inning since July 11 vs. the Pirates.
“I think it did set the tone,” Reds manager Bryan Price said of the first inning. “I hate to say [it] broke a curse or whatever, but we put the barrel on the ball. We’ve had our share of soft outs here lately. Even if you’re making hard outs, you’re encouraged the next time you go up and hit.”
A night after the bullpen was taxed for seven innings during a 15-inning 2-1 loss, starting pitcher Mike Leake came up with exactly the kind of start the Reds needed. Leake dealt 7 2/3 innings of scoreless baseball with five hits, no walks, two hit batters and eight strikeouts.
In the process, Leake weathered allowing a one-out triple in the third inning, having runners on the corners with one out in the fourth and a pair of two-out hits in the seventh. He had come in 1-3 with a 4.83 ERA in his previous five starts with 17 runs and 48 hits allowed over 31 2/3 innings.
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