Going into tonight's game, the Reds were tied with Houston for fifth. Houston's off tonight, so the Reds' win put them up by a half game. Yay!

But more than that, they're tied with Pittsburgh for fourth by number of games back, but since they've played more games, they're actually ahead of the Pirates if you count it that way. Yippee!

Who wishes they'd changed management earlier??

From The Enquirer:

NO GEORGE: George Grande will not call games for FSN Ohio during the Florida series and possibly the Milwaukee series that follows.

He's in Connecticut, attending to his mother, who is ill.

Michael Reghi will fill in. Reghi has done nine years of major-league play-by-play and has done Cleveland Cavaliers games on FSN for 13 years.

Three things come immediately to mind, pretty much simultaneously:

1. I hope that George's mother is doing better soon. We here at RHM are on double-positive-vibe duty, sending them both to Connecticut as well as toward Alex Gonzalez's family in Florida.
2. They had to bring in someone else to fill in for George?? They know they hired about 1,500 broadcasters for various media this season, right?
3. Wait a minute, haven't I mentioned George Grande's mother before? Yep, I sure did. In April of 2005, she had just turned 99 years old, which would make her now--hold on while I get my abacus--101. Dang, that's even longer than the Cubs losing streak.

The Reds put on a display of stamina last night when they hung in there to beat the Braves in a game and two-thirds by a score of 5-4.

I pretty much dread writing game wraps for extra innings games due to, ya know, the longness, but the Crack Technical Staff specially requested that I put up something for this one, “just because you can,” he said. The line-score tool that he put together for me allows me to put in information for up to16 innings, and he wanted me to actually try out those poor, neglected spaces for innings 10-15.

So there's your line score for ya. For the rest of this, I'm going to do the bullet thing:

• Brandon Phillips asked for the day off, as if he somehow knew that he'd need to be available to play the final six innings (after the first eight). Is Phillips psychic? A prophet? A soothsayer? Highest jumping soothsayer I ever saw.
• The Reds turned four double-plays. And one of them was that crazy five-infielder maneuver where they brought Ryan Freel out of center to stand on second base. Can you believe that worked?! I remember one time when someone--the Cardinals maybe--tried to pull that crap with Barry Larkin coming to the plate, and he just lobbed one into center field. That's totally what I thought we'd see again.
• Norris Hopper has gotten himself a signature move with that bunting for a hit he loves so much. I remember Larkin doing that, too.
• Adam Dunn had a home run to score the two runs that kept the game going into extras, but perhaps the bigger story is Aaron Harang's double. OK, probably not a bigger story, but certainly more surprising.

I thought Mike Stanton was going to blow it when he came in in the eighth, but he struck out the side. Then David Weathers blew the save. What the heck?

• I really enjoyed the series with the Braves for some reason. I'm hope the visit to Florida is just as fun.

The win brings the Reds record to 40-55 and their winning streak to three. Tonight they face off against the Marlins at 7:05 p.m. Matt Belisle goes up against Sergio Mitre.