»RELATED: Reds manager expects no animosity in Pirates series
Instead, Cincinnati had to settle for a split. After the Pirates posted their sixth straight win over Cincinnati with an 8-5 win in the opener, the Reds roared back with a six-run first inning on the way to an 8-1 in the nightcap.
Slick-fielding shortstop Jose Iglesias crunched his first career grand slam and the Reds sent 11 batters to the plate in the first inning while piling up five hits and two walks against highly regarded Pittsburgh rookie Mitch Keller, who was making his major league debut. Yasiel Puig and Nick Senzel added run-scoring singles to the onslaught, and Derek Dietrich teamed up with Puig for mammoth solo home runs on back-to-back pitches in the seventh.
“Everytime you get such a lead, it doesn’t hurt,” Iglesias said. “I put a good swing on it to put my team in position to win the game. It feels good. I did it with the bat this time.”
“We knew we had an opportunity in the first inning,” first-year manager David Bell said. “The grand slam was huge. Their pitcher settled down and actually did a good job for them. Many times you get a lead against a good team you let them get back into it.”
The Reds and Pirates are scheduled to play Game Three of the series on Tuesday at 6:40 p.m. Bell announced after Game Two that right-hander Lucas Sims will be recalled from Triple-A Louisville on Tuesday to start.
Sonny Gray, who was 0-4 over his first nine starts, won for the second time in his last two starts. The right-hander allowed five hits and one run with two walks and seven strikeouts in six innings. Left-hander Cody Reed, recalled from Triple-A Louisville to be the 26thman Major League Baseball allows for doubleheaders, followed with two innings of relief before right-hander Matt Bowman finished the game.
“I had some problems in the fifth and sixth,” Gray said. “I was happy to make the pitches to get out of those innings. I feel like I was throwing OK early in the year, but I was giving up the three-run home run or the two-out double. The last two games, I’ve been able to make the pitches I needed to make.”
“Not only did we need that game, but we needed him to go deeper,” Bell said. “He finished strong, too. He was outstanding. He made pitches and competed. It was fun to watch.”
In the opener, reliever David Hernandez allowed rookie Bryan Reynolds’s two-run triple and Starling Marte’s two-run homer in a four-run eighth inning that was the difference in Pittsburgh’s win.
Luis Castillo, who went into the day ranked second in the National League in earned-run average despite getting roughed up for four runs in 2-2/3 innings on Wednesday in Milwaukee, was only slightly better in Monday’s opener. The right-hander allowed three runs and six hits in 5 1/3 innings. He struck out four and walked four.
“I had too many walks today,” said Castillo, whose ERA climbed from 2.38 to 2.45. “I threw too many pitches. I am going to keep working and keep getting better. My job is to get ground balls. After that, whatever happens, happens.”
“Luis was good today,” Bell said. “There were a couple plays that could have been made. Our defense has been so good, too. I felt like we were going to come back”
Joey Votto had three hits in the opener, including a double, in his fourth consecutive multihit game. Votto’s three hits left him tied with Brandon Phillips for eighth on Cincinnati’s career hits list with 1,774. His double left him tied with Johnny Bench for fourth on the franchise’s career doubles list with 381.
The first game lasted 3 hours, 51 minutes, Cincinnati’s longest nine-inning game of the season. The doubleheader was created when the Pirates-Reds game on March 30 was rained out.
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