Reds Overcome Coffey's Crumminess, 5-4

For seven innings last night, the author was pretty happy with the teams performance. Then Big Frucking Nasty entered and was big frucking terrible. He didn't record and out and gave up the tying home run to douchebag of great note, Eric Byrnes. But hopefully that did teach Bailey a valuable lesson, you can't give up any runs, despite how well you pitch, if you'd like to get the win. This bullpen just won't let you get away with it. But then in the Reds half of the eighth, NorHo singled up the middle against one of the 15 Tony Penas who are in the major leagues, and we were all proud to be Reds fans again. Yeah Reds! Yeah Norris Hopper!

Last night we also saw the return of a couple of old friends/enemies, Kirk Saarloos and Jared Burton [as well as Mike Stanton off the DL the day before]. And of course Jeff Keppinger, who could forget him. Stanton actually got in the game and pitched very well. Two innings of hitless relief, not too bad Mike. Maybe you really were hurt. On the other hand, the author happened to take a look at Saarloos' numbers at Louisville and they were not a whole lot less awful than they were at Cincinnati. Sure that ERA is at an oustanding 4.30, outstanding for this bullpen anyway, but 22 hits allowed in 14.2 innings? Those hitters probably aren't quite as good as the ones he'll being seeing here shortly. But who knows, maybe he's got that quality salad back. A romaine or maybe some type of spring mix. As a result of those guys' return, we had to say goodbye to Marcus McBeth and Ricky Stone. Stone's arm, as it was critically injured, sadly had to be put to sleep. Looks like it's back to the family and the drywall business. It was a nice story while it lasted. And McBeth will probably be back once he learns how not to give up bloop hits to every batter [and Juan Castro's hurt...quiet cheers].

Anyway, back to last night. Nice win team. How about a sweep so everybody can talk about how Mackanin has got this team turned around to make a second half run. Which they most certainly will. Some guy with a very quality name, Yusmeiro, on the mound today. Let's rough him up. Reds! Reds! Reds!