The good news: Todd Frazier’s rookie of the year season proceeds apace. (Photo by BubbaFan at the english language wikipedia)

That sucked.

Things were lovely for the first five innings. Before the 6th, things were going reasonably well for the Redlegs, who were winning 5-2 based on strong hitting, and reasonably good pitching from Latos.

The sixth inning is where everything became terrible. Latos let the first two batters on base via singles – and then allowed two consecutive home runs from Allen Craig and Reds fan favorite Yadier Molina. After Latos walked the next batter (all with no outs), we brought in Alfredo Simon, who then allowed a series of hits/wild pitches/sac flies which allowed a total of 6 runs to score in the inning. (Alfredo semi-redeemed himself by pitching two more scoreless innings.

The offense did alright, really, chasing Lance Lynn in the third inning with good performances from Frazier (per usual), Phillips, and even Rolen. But there were plenty of strikeouts. We threatened in the bottom of the 9th against closer Jason Motte – Ludwick and Frazier got on with singles, but Rolen struck out for the third out.

Even so, as a whole, this loss is more on Latos than anyone. It’s really been awhile since Mat Latos has been so outright bad. I’m not getting on his case, he’s had a really great last couple of months, but tonight was bad.Nights like this are bound to happen I guess – we’ve still got a six game lead, and as long as we can win one game this series, we’ll stay five games up.

So… how’s Joey Votto doing, again?