Cardinals And Reds Turn To Offense In The Deciding Game

The Reds and Cardinals hooked up in the rubber game of this three-game series after the teams traded 1-0 wins.

The bats came our blazing for both teams and the defending National League champions prevailed, 7-6.

The Reds' offense scored three runs in th first off Lance Lynn, two on Jay Bruce's two-run home run off Lance Lynn.  Bruce belted the Lynn pitch 449 feet on his 27th birthday.  Todd Frazier hit one even farther, 474 feet into the upper deck in leftfield immediately following Bruce.

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"We need to keep doing that," Frazier said. "We have a team that can hit. We just need to finish."

Joey Votto had two singles, a double and a walk, scoring on Bruce's homer and Frazier's three run blast.

"It is good to see Joey swinging the bat," Price said.  "We had better at bats.  We put some pressure on their pitchers."

Homer Bailey, making his first start, couldn't hold the lead.

With two-out and no one on base in the second. Matt Adams poked a single to left against the shift.  Jhonny Peralta lined a pitch into the leftfield corner to make it a 3-2 game.

Bailey wasn't sharp before he could finish the fifth, Price had to replace him with Nick Christiani by then St. Louis took the lead.  Bailey missed some spring starts with a slight groin injury.

"Homer wasn't as sharp as he will be as the season goes on," Price said.  "He can usually get his breaking ball over for strikes when he is on.  He wasn't able to do that.  You have to give some credit to the Cardinals. They fouled off some tough pitches and took some close pitches, until they got something they could square up."

Bailey knew he was off.

"I got behind a lot," Bailey said. "I was missing be just an inch or two. I think the layoff came back to bite me a little bit."

The Cardinals built a four-run lead in the seventh.  Trevor Bell walked two and gave up a bizarre single that loaded the bases with no outs.

Matt Holiday hit a ball to centerfield that Billy Hamilton attempted to catch.  It was unclear whether the ball hit off his glove or the wall.  Bruce fielded the carom on the fly which would have been an out. The firstbase umpire, Mark Ripperger, signaled out.  Secondbase umpire, Gary Cederstrom, signaled safe.
Crew chief Cederstrom decided to review the play without a challenge by either manager.  The replay revealed the ball was off the wall and all hands were safe.

Logan Ondrusek entered and gave up run-scoring singles to Allen Craig and Yadier Molina.  Holliday scored on a wild pitch.

Todd Frazier hit a three-run home run to get the Reds within a run.

Trevor Rosenthal got the last four outs for his second save.