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Dateline: Goodyear, Arizona
Rece Hinds lined a three-run home run onto the grassy knoll behind the left field fence at Goodyear Ballpark in the ninth inning to send the Reds to dinner with a 14-13 score that would shame the Super Bowl.
The Reds have hit 14 home runs over the last three games, Hinds was the fifth of the day.
Elly De La Cruz crushed a 436 foot home run off Cole Irvin with a man on. It cleared the batter's eye in center field. Will Benson hit a two-run home run later in the first inning. Matt McLain hit his fourth home run of the spring. All of them have come this week.
Jose Franco started for the Reds. He surrendered a run in the first inning. Alex Call's line single eluded Christian Encarnacion-Strand's diving attempt to open the game. Two force plays, including one ill advised decision by De La Cruz. The shortstop fielded the ball on the second base side and tried a back-hand flip to McLain who was also chasing the ball. McLain did not see a play at second. His throw to first was late. Max Muncy popped up to De La Cruz in the outfield. De La Cruz dropped it but forced, Alex Freeland at second base with Call going to third. Santiago Espinal flied to right to score Call.
Muncy and Espinal hit back-to-back home runs. Noah Miller launched a two-run home run off Emilio Pagan. Espinal, who was homerless last season with the Reds hit a three-run home run off Tony Santillan.
Connor Phillips gave up three runs in his inning. Call doubled in Mike Siani. Eliezer Alfonzo scored on a fielder's choice and Call scored on Espinal's second sacrifice fly of the game.
Espinal drove in six runs. He had a total of 16 RBI for Cincinnati last year.
McLain singled for his third hit of the game. De La Cruz singled and Nathaniel Lowe's second home run, a three-run short was off Paul Gervase.
Hagen Danner pitched a rare 1-2-3 inning on this day.
Julian Aguiar, recovering from injury, gave up a home run to former Reds top draft choice, Nick Senzel that gave the Dodgers a comfortable 13-10 lead.
"It was really a tough day to pitch," Francona said. "We saw on both sides. The hard thing for us is we kept walking people. There are going to be balls flying out of here and the infield is quick but when you walk people to boot, that's when it really gets tough. I thought Aggie was pretty good. Golly it's easy for me to say don't walk people but with the wind galing out it's not a good day to pitch."
Reds pitchers walked eight batters but Aguiar was not one of them. He pitched two innings, and gave up two hits but he didn't walk anybody and struck out four of the eight batters he faced.
Jordan Weems came on to get three outs for the Champs to seal the game but walks to Alfredo Duno, one of the top Reds' prospects, and P.J. Higgins set him up for failure. Hector Rodriguez came with a couple feet of tying the game with a double that scored Duno.
Hinds ended it with his second home run this spring. He is hitting .500, 10 games into the spring.
"We were going through our outfield this morning. I really haven't seen an outfielder who has not had a nice spring," Francona said. "If you go down the list (Blake) Dunn, Hinds, Hector (Rodriguez), they're doing some good things."
Francona constantly cautions every one the stats don't matter in spring training.
"You're exactly right the stats don't matter," Francona said. "Even though they don't matter, I'd rather see us hit good than not hit good. We're going to get back to Cincinnati and we're probably going to play through some iffy weather. The field will be slower. But that's ok. Playing when you're supposed to play and who you're supposed to play, I'd much rather see us do good than not do good."
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