You may remember the other night when the Cincinnati Reds clinched the 2010 National League Central Division. They were happy, the fans were happy. There was champagne and beer spraying all over the clubhouse. Oh, and some victory cigars were passed out by Orlando Cabrera, too.

Apparently, some killjoys with a knowledge of Ohio state law phoned in some complaints upon seeing those stogeys.

Five people called a statewide smoking ban complaint hotline, Merz said. Those complaints were sent to the city health department today for investigation. [Bob] Castellini will get letter soon notifying him of the alleged violation.

Now, the Reds get to look forward to having a health inspector come within 30 days.

It does make you wonder, though, if one cranky, unpleasant manager in the Central with a law degree might have been watching and been one of those 5 callers.

The Reds are going to the playoffs.

It’s been so long, but with the St. Louis Cardinals loss yesterday coupled with the Cincinnati Reds win, the magic number is down to 6. I keep running the numbers over and over in my head, for certainly I’ve missed something. The Reds lead is back to 8 games, and they have just 11 games left. Meanwhile, the Cardinals have 13 games left.

I know the Reds haven’t clinched yet, but with each game played, it becomes ever more harder and unlikely for the Cardinals to pull off the miraculous comeback. Or, as we Reds fans are used to, the spectacular collapse by Cincinnati. This 2010 edition has had its share of spectacular failure, but I don’t think there’ll be anything on that order of magnitude.

Just think, if the Reds 4-7, the Cardinals have to go 13-0 just to tie. Does anyone think that either of those teams has either of those records in them? Sure the Reds have had a losing streak here and there and could pull off a 4-7 record over the last 11 in a pinch, but there’s no way I can see St. Louis going undefeated for the rest of the season. They’re just a bad team.

Face it, Reds fans. Pinch yourself or whatever you need to do to believe that you’re not dreaming. For the first time since 1995, we’re going to the playoffs. We’re going to see October baseball that matters.

In what’s becoming a recurring theme of the 2010 season for the St. Louis Cardinals, Tony La Russa is again complaining about something that happened in the game against the Washington Nationals yesterday.

In the 9th inning, Nationals rookie reliever Drew Storen lost control of a fastball when pitching to Matt Holliday. The pitch sailed behind the batter. La Russa said, “If somebody throws the ball behind you, you’re not happy. Especially up in that area. If you don’t have that kind of command, it wasn’t intentional, then you don’t belong in this league.”

La Russa has made similar complaints before. I remember him making even harsher statements once when Reds pitcher Aaron Harang threw a wild pitch. Strangely, I never hear of other teams managers making the same criticisms when Cardinals pitchers throw wild pitches.

Of course, this is coming from a manager with a DWI on his record. I could make a cheap shot about how someone who can’t control their alcohol consumption doesn’t belong in the league. However, I’ll instead sit back and enjoy the Cardinals meltdown this year. For all of their “bitching and moaning” seems to do nothing more than cause them to lose focus and fall further and further behind the Reds. They lost that game to the Nationals yesterday.

Boxscore

The St. Louis Cardinals have been having a terrible time of it lately. First, they lose a series to the last-place Pittsburgh Pirates. Yesterday, they headed to Washington, D.C. to take on the last-place Washington Nationals and again fell. Although this time, it took them 13 innings to lose.

Chris Carpenter, who will no doubt have difficulty explaining the loss to his child, started for the Cardinals. If it weren’t for the unearned runs, he would have had a quality start, as he pitched 6 innings and allowed 3 earned runs. Unfortunately, Felipe Lopez is an everyday player for St. Louis. And as Reds fans remember all too well, he can have problems throwing the ball, as he did in the 3rd, which led to 3 unearned runs scoring.

St. Louis did take the lead back after that error, thanks to Albert Pujols’ 400th career home run. But it wasn’t enough. Carpenter and the bullpen could not keep the Nationals from scoring. Going into the top of the 9th, Washington was ahead 8-6. It was time for another of the Cardinals patented come-this-close-to-winning comebacks.

Except that this time, the Cardinals actually did take the lead. Brendan Ryan doubled in a run, Matt Holliday was hit by a pitch with the bases loaded to tie it, and then Randy Winn drove in a go-ahead run and an insurance run with a single.

It wasn’t enough for closer Ryan Franklin, though, who allowed the Nationals to tie it on a 2-run shot by Roger Bernadino. The game went into extras and nobody scored until the bottom of the 13th when Ian Desmond hit the walk-off single.

The loss drops the Cardinals to 4 games behind the first-place Reds. They have now lost 3 in a row. Most troubling may be that 2 of those games were started by their big guns–Adam Wainwright and Carpenter. Their record for their last 10 is 3-7.