CINCINNATI — The opportunity the Cardinals failed to exploit early in the game came back around to haunt them later as the bullpen leaked and lost a lead.
As the Cardinals did with a series of walks in the fifth inning, the Reds, with the help of an error, loaded the bases with one out in the eighth inning. The Cardinals failed to do anything with their opportunity. The Reds didn’t. The Reds won.
Cincinnati scored thrice against the Cardinals’ bullpen and overtook them for a 6-5 victory Friday night at Great American Ball Park. The game seesawed between the teams as Paul Goldschmidt drilled a pitch 448 feet for the first run of the game, Harrison Bader followed with a homer in the second inning, and the back and forth continued until Cincinnati seized on the week’s trend: the Cardinals’ recent run of misplaced leads, late. Reds reliever Heath Hembree, closing out games for a bullpen riddled by injury, struck out pinch-hitter Adam Wainwright — not Yadier Molina, who the Cardinals tried to get an off day — to secure the victory.
The Cardinals, back at .500, had a chance to leapfrog Cincinnati and move into second place in the National League Central at the end of a week they began in fourth.
The Reds rallied to tie the game in the eighth against Ryan Helsley before concocting the game-winning rally with help from an error, a call, and a fly ball in the eighth.
Tasked with preserving the two-run lead in the seventh, Helsley, who has recently thrived in the roll of cleaning up messy innings, allowed two singles to the first two batters he faced.The first three batters of the inning reached base. Eugenio Suarez’s double opened up the inning by scoring the first batter and getting Joey Votto to third. The Reds’ former MVP scored on a wild pitch to knot the game, 5-5.
In the eighth, a groundball back to Giovanny Gallegos gave him a chance to start a double play that might have freed him from the inning.
He threw wide to second.
After the error came a walk nudged along by home-plate umpire C.B. Bucknor’s strike zone, and then the sacrifice fly that put the Reds back in front. Tyler Stephenson lofted a pitch from Gallegos to center field, and Kyle Farmer scored ahead of the throw for the go-ahead run.
What could have been a morsel of trivia, a spot of curiosity to question later, turned into a pivotal part of the Cardinals’ sixth-inning rally.
Tommy Edman, the Cardinals’ switch-hitting multi-tasking utility man, batted right-handed in each of first two at-bats. That wouldn’t be notable except that they came against a right-handed pitcher – Cincinnati starter Tyler Mahle. It was the first time in big league career that Edman had batted right-handed against a right-handed pitcher. Mahle’s stats invited the attempt. The Reds’ starter entered Friday holding left-handed batters to a .271 slugging percentage and a .551 OPS. His reverse splits had right-handed betters slugging .508 with an .838 OPS against him.
The two home runs Mahle allowed for the only two runs the Cardinals got against him were both blistering liners into the left-field seats — and from right-handed batters.
In far fewer at-bats, Edman has hit far better from the right side of the plate this season, pitting his .970 OPS from that side opposite his .598 OPS from the left in 246 more plate appearances. But when the Reds went to a reliever in the sixth — a right-handed reliever — Edman shifted back to the left side, and helped put a rally in motion with his single.
Bader opened the inning with a double off Edgar Garcia. He got to third on Edman’s single, and when Edman stole second the Cardinals had the go-ahead run in scoring position. They both scored on Andrew Knizner’s double that hopped off a glove, off the ground and over the wall. Knizner scored on Dylan Carlson’s sacrifice fly to give the Cardinals, in the span of three batters, the tying, go-ahead, and insurance runs.
The inning after Mahle left, Edman went back to switch hitting.
The inning after Mahle left, the Cardinals pulled ahead.
The rally came to erase what would have been Wade LeBlanc’s third loss of the season but not in time to present him with his first win. He didn’t pitch deep enough into the game to qualify after allowing three runs and scattering eight hits through four innings. LeBlanc figured to have an edge entering the game because of Cincinnati’s struggles this season against lefties. The Reds entered the weekend batting .228 as a team against lefties — the third-lowest average in the majors. Moreover, they had the highest groundball rate against lefties in the majors (47.7%) and they placed one of their best hitters against lefties, NL batting leader Nicholas Castellanos, on the 10-day injured list.
LeBlanc got plenty of grounders, but Votto scalded one down the first-base line and into the corner for a two-run double in the first inning. Votto’s two RBIs gave him 1,010 for his career, moving ahead of Frank Robinson for the fourth-most in Cincinnati Reds history. Three innings later the Reds started to elevate pitches from LeBlanc and Farmer thrust the Reds ahead, 3-2, with a solo homer to the left-field seats in the fourth inning. LeBlanc steered out of that inning, and as his replaced warmed the Cardinals were given a gift.
It took Mahle 11 pitches to undo the mess he created with 16.
In his fifth and final innings, the Reds’ right-hander faced the top of the Cardinals’ lineup for the third time and promptly walked three consecutive batters. What started with a four-pitch walk to Carlson continued with a six-pitch walk to Goldschmidt and then the walk that loaded the bases to Nolan Arenado. It’s a spot the Cardinals have found themselves in often — and more than 20 times this season walked in a run. They did twice in the ninth inning of the blown game Tuesday to the Cubs.
This was a chance to balance the ledger — a bit — but Mahle didn’t break.
The right-hander threw 11 pitches total to Tyler O’Neill and Paul DeJong, keeping either from putting a ball in play and striking out both to end the inning and the threat.
