Boxscore

The battle between the ERA leaders in both leagues was not disappointing yesterday as Cliff Lee and Edinson Volquez squared off.

The Reds, who are hot for the first time this year, managed to score more runs off Lee than he’d allowed all year, thanks to Adam Dunn and Joey Votto home runs. Volquez allowed two runs, which is more than he’d allowed in any start so far this year, but it was more than good enough.

The Reds are playing good baseball right now, having swept two straight series against two first-place clubs. They travel to the west coast next, which has always marked a turning point in their season in years past. Will they die in California again this year? Maybe, maybe not. Odds are, I won’t be awake to see it.

Bronson Arroyo tries to beat Brad Penny at 10:10pm EDT.

Boxscore

The Pirates again failed to reach the elusive heights of a .500 record yesterday, falling to the Cubs. Things seemed to be lined up for them, what with them facing the notorious Jason Marquis, but it wasn’t in the cards.

Phil Dumatrait started well for the Pirates, but that second time through the Cubs lineup did him in, and provided Chicago with all the runs they needed.

Chicago moved to 10 games over .500, holding a 2 games lead in first place, while Pittsburgh fell to a 4th place tie with the good-for-the-last-week Reds.

The Pirates have an off-day, while the Cubs travel to Houston, sending out Ted Lilly to face the Astros’ Brian Moehler at 7:05pm EDT. I believe it’s ESPN’s Monday night baseball game.

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The other day during a rain delay, Fox Sports Ohio passed some of the time by talking with Junior about his game-related superstitions. Thanks to the Crack Technical Staff for capturing the details.

Griffey likes to drive the same car to the park every day. If two days in a row, he doesn’t get any hits, he won’t drive that car the third day. If he doesn’t get any hits for a week, he ships the car back to his home in Florida and has a new car brought up.

Griffey refuses to use a game bat if someone else uses it.

Junior always walks to home plate the same way. He likes to lead with his right foot going into the batter’s box. When dugout on the third base side, waits for the umpire and catcher to settle before heading to the box.

Griffey doesn’t eat leftovers (except for after the Thanksgiving meal).

In pursuit of the grace of the baseball gods, he has taken showers fully clothed and has also thrown away an entire uniform.

When Griff was with the Mariners, teammate Jay Buhner had a 4-hit night. In a demonstration of how far he’s willing to go, Griffey sneaked into Buhner’s house that evening and placed his bat between Buhner and his wife. Apparently, some of the hitting rubbed off on the bat because Griffey got a couple hits the next day.

The Reds faced Fausto Carmona today, and Slyde on Red Reporter commented on what the Reds’ hitting approach needs to be.

[Carmona] has nearly TWICE AS MANY WALKS AS STRIKEOUTS. I yelled that…because the Reds have to, have to, have to be patient today.

Really? You think that that’s what will be going through the minds of a Dusty Baker-led team? Wow. It’s so sad. Reds fans were most definitely not paying attention during Baker’s disastrous managerial stint in Chicago.

Let’s consult the box score: Carmona had 4 strikeouts, so given his historical trends, you would think he’d walk 8. However, Dusty Baker, hitting genius that he is, tells all his batters to swing, swing, swing. So I’m going with zero walks.

I love being right. 🙂