Boxscore

The Cincinnati Reds had their second afternoon game in a row today, and like yesterday, it was a one-run game. Unfortunately, this time it went against the Reds, who fell to 3-4.

Mat Latos made his second start for Cincinnati and again had trouble in the 5th. This time, he made it through 5 innings and gave up only 2 runs. However, his pitch count was almost at 100, so he was done early. He had better command, but threw a lot of pitches to a lot of batters. Despite getting many batters to 2 strikes, he had a hard time putting them away.

The Reds’ bullpen was already short-staffed, thanks to Johnny Cueto’s short outing previously, and both Logan Ondrusek and Aroldis Chapman were deemed unavailable. Sam LeCure and Jose Arredondo threw 2 scoreless innings apiece, which gave the offense time to finally wake up.

I know it’s only been a week into the season, but the inconsistent offense is starting to remind me of last year. This time, they didn’t score until the bottom of the 9th, blowing Brad Lidge’s save chance thanks to a 2-run single from Ryan Ludwick.

That sent the game to extra innings. Instead of sending out good relief pitchers like Bill Bray or Sean Marshall, Dusty Baker sent out Alfredo Simon. Simon was a last-minute pick-up who has done nothing good with the team so far this year. He continued to unimpress today.

Simon hit the first batter he faced, and everyone knew bad things were in store. The next batter hit a foul pop-up that Scott Rolen caught.The next batter followed with a hit. Then Xavier Nady grounded out, but managed to advance both runners.

With runners on second and third and 2 outs, Simon threw a wild pitch that allowed the batter he’d hit with a pitch to score. Just the latest in the line of horrible outings from Simon.

Still, there’s plenty of ineptitude to go around this game. Much of that is with the offense. I mean, Simon was the only pitcher who didn’t do well. The others allowed just 2 runs during the 9 innings. And if you can’t win when your pitching staff allows only 2 runs, your offense has to be the one to take the blame.

The Reds break their string of day games tomorrow when Bronson Arroyo takes the mound at 7:05pm EDT.

Boxscore

The Reds avoided a series sweep at the hands of the Cardinals this afternoon by eking out a last minute win, 3-4.

Johnny Cueto took the mound for the Reds and added to his reputation of awesomeness. He allowed three runs (earned) on seven hits in seven innings. He also struck out three. Jose Arredondo, Bill Bray, and Logan Ondrusek took their scoreless turns, but it was Aroldis Chapman who really brought it all home, with his five strike-outs in two innings. Firey!

Joey Votto, Jay Bruce, Chris Heisey, and Wilson Valdez had an RBI apiece. Votto, in fact, went 4-for-5 with two runs scored.

Tomorrow the Reds play a rare second day game in a row as they visit the Washington Nationals. Mat Latos takes on Gio Gonzalez at 1:05 p.m. You can catch it on Fox Sports Ohio and MLB Network.

I’m a little late starting the live blog today–I got out of work late, then traffic was bad, and that just threw off everything for the rest of the night. Plus, Zeldink was busy writing up that bit about Brandon Phillips new contract. But I’m here now, and wearing entirely different clothes than yesterday. And so far, it’s working: only one home run allowed in the first inning this time!

Damn those Cardinals

1. Jay, CF
2. Beltran, RF
3. Holiday, LF
4. Berkman, 1B
5. Freese, 3B
6. Molina, C
7. Descalso, 2B
8. Greene, SS
9. Lohse, P

And Your Cin…Cinnati Reds

1. Harris, 2B
2. Cozart, SS
3. Votto, 1B
4. Rolen, 3B
5. Bruce,RF
6. Heisey, LF
7. Stubbs, CF
8. Mesoraco, C
9. Leake, P

The Cincinnati Reds today officially announced what they’d been working on for most of the off-season: a contract extension for Brandon Phillips.

Phillips, who was in the final year of his contract, renegotiated that into a new, 6-year contract worth $72.5 million.

“We originally had a certain number of years in mind that we were going to do the deal,” Jocketty said. “Then we realized that we’d probably have to extend another year, and that’s what we did. We went another year on the contract. We were able to get the deal done rather quick after that.”

The new deal adds salaries of $10 million for next year, $11 million in 2014, $12 million in 2015, $13 million in 2016 and $14 million in 2017.

Phillips is now signed with the team through 2017. Joey Votto is signed through 2023. Jay Bruce is signed through 2016. And Johnny Cueto, Aroldis Chapman, and Sean Marshall all have multi-year deals. The team has decided on a core group of players to build some winning teams around, but that’s not the most important thing. How does this compare to Yadier Molina’s off-season contract?

The good news is that Phillips and Molina are both signed with their respective teams through 2017. Moline added 5 years to his current contract and will be getting $75 million during that time. His annual average is $15 million. During those same 5 years, Phillips annual average is $12 million. Clearly, Yadi has a more lucrative contract, but there’s no doubt that Phillips’ will take up a higher percentage of his team’s payroll than Yadi.

I’m hoping we get more fireworks between the two.

For the last couple years, the Cincinnati Reds have turned Opening Night into quite an event, one that I think is more enjoyable than Opening Day.

The first event after the gates open a couple hours before the first pitch has all Reds on the 25-man roster walk down a red carpet and pose for pictures and sign a few autographs for many of the fans gathered at the fences beside the carpet.

In previous years, the red carpet walk was not optimized, with the players wandering around a wide open space, and fans dangerously pushing against each other to try to get close to an autograph opportunity. We criticized this in a podcast last year, and we were very happy to see the criticisms were addressed this year. The red carpet was extended, and there was plenty of space for fans to gather along the walk route. I never once felt like me or my son might be trampled to death. Plus, it gave me the opportunity for some nice up-close pictures of all the players.

As usual, the Reds put on a great event, and the players were all friendly and accommodating. I definitely got a thrill when Joey Votto was standing next to me signing my son’s Reds Heads’ jersey. The game didn’t turn out so well, but overall, the night was awesome.