The first game of a series is golden for the Reds. They are 31-18 in the series openers.
The score was 1-1 after six innings as the teams exchanged solo home runs, one by TJ Friedl in the second and one by Minnesota’s Byron Buxton in the fifth, his first game after a month on the injured list.
Then came the seventh.
—Elly De La Cruz was 4 for 27 with 15 strikeouts when he stepped into the batter’s box with the bases loaded in the seventh.
On the first pitch, he launched his first career grand slam home run. And it was his 24th home run, a club record for switch-hitters.
He passed the 23 hit in 2005 by infielder Felipe Lopez.
—Spencer Steer led off the seventh, dragging a 1 for 14 bat to the plate. He tripled off the right field wall.
— Friedl was 2 for 15 when the game began. But he produced two runs on balls that traveled 341 feet and 45 feet.
He homered in the second inning, a 341-footer. After Spencer tripled, Friedl pushed a 45-foot safety squeeze bunt up the first base line. Not only did it score Steer, to give the Reds a 2-1 lead, Friedl was safe at first with a single.
—Ty France was 0 for 12 when he stepped in after Friedl’s bunt and he doubled, scoring Friedl for a 3-1 lead.
—Noelvi Marte and Jonathan India walked, filling the bases, and De La Cruz crushed his grand slam. Pitchers have fed De La Cruz a top-heavy dose of breaking pitches during his recent struggles.
But relief pitcher Jorge Alcala dangled a 90 mph slider and De La Cruz took care of it.
“I feel so good today,” said De La Cruz, who has missed only two games and leads the majors in games played. “I want to play every day, I don’t want (days off).
“It means a lot, the first one,” he said of his grand slam. What’s next? “I don’t know, you never know. I don’t know what comes next.”
Not only do the Reds win openers, they win games started by rookie Julian Aguiar. He won Friday night to go 2-0, but the Reds have won all six of his major league starts.
Through six innings, he had given up two hits, the Buxton home run and an infideld hit by Trevor Larnach in the second.
That was his only difficult inning. Larnach opened the inning with his infield hit and with two outs Aguiar hit Willi Castro with a pitch, putting two on.
But he struck out Buxton.
Cincinnati’s long seventh inning most likely affected Aguiar and after the six-run inning. He started the seventh inning for the first time in his short career and walked Larnach to open the inning and Carlos Santana singled.
He retired Buxton on a ground ball and manager David Bell decided that was enough and brought in Buck Farmer. He gave up a two-run bloop single to No. 9 hitter Brooks Lee.
While only one run scored with Aguiar on the mound, that two given up by Farmer were charged to him — 6 2/3 innings, three runs, three hits, two walks and four strikeouts.
Aguiar didn’t see De La Cruz’s home run. Because the inning was dragging along, he was in the tunnel behind the dugout throwing some pitches.
“The crazy thing is that I was down in the tunnel throwing some pitches to keep the body loose,” he said. Yeah, I heard it. I heard the crowd go crazy and I heard my teammataes go crazy,” he said.
And of his 86-pitch night, he said, “I just grooved along. All my pitches were working with me. The game went back quick so I didn’t realize I was going out to the mound for the seventh inning. I heard the seventh inning stretch (song), so I said, ‘Oh, OK.’”
With the entire starting staff from Opening Day gone, Aguiar has stepped in bravely and boldly along with Nick Martinez and rookie Rhett Lowder.
“We all just came together, be strong, take care of what you can take care of and take the team as far as we can go,” he said. “Just put the anchor down for the team.”
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