By Hal McCoy
The fumbles, tumbles and stumbles are over for the Cincinnati Reds — at least for one day.
At least the eight-game losing streak is dead and buried as the Reds stopped the Houston Astros, 3-1, Saturday afternoon in Great American Ball Park.
How did the Reds get the loss monster off their backs?
With a little help from the Astros and the Reds will accept all help and gifts they can get these days.
The Reds were down, 1-0, in the fifth inning and had runners on second and first with one out.
Jose Trevino hit a routine lazy fly ball to right field for what appeared to be the second out.
But it wasn’t.
Houston right fielder Cam Smith dropped it, plumb dropped it out of his glove like a hot charcoal.
That filled the bases and Matt McLain drilled a two-run single to left for a 2-1 lead. Elly De La Cruz followed with a two-out run-scoring single.
And that was it. Three runs in one inning as the Reds have scored in only one inning of their last 21 innings.
But that’s all they needed this day because they had their 23-year-old stopper, Chase Burns, on the mound.
He gave up a two-out home run in the fifth inning to Braden Shewmake with his third-best pitch, a change-up.
But the Reds scored their three runs in the bottom of the fifth and Burns was much appreciative. He gave up a leadoff double to Yordan Alvarez to open the sixth, then finished his day 1-2-3 and struck out Cam Smith to end it.
From there it was up to the bullpen, a group that was plug ugly during the eight-game losing streak.
They were perfect on this day. Nine up, nine down.
Brock Burke: 1-2-3 in the seventh.
Graham Ashcraft: 1-2-3 in the eighth, with a long-run snag of Jose Altuve’s bid for a double by Dane Myers near the left-center wall.
Pierce Johnsons: 1-2-3 in the ninth for his first save, with a long-run sng of Christian Walker’s bid for a double by Dane Myers (again) near the right-center wall.
Will Benson made back-to-back above average plays in the third inning.
Burns, though, was the perfect anecdote to losing a streak, with his fifth straight quality start.
He gave up just the one run, four hits, walked three and struck out two. Two? Usually he gets two an inning, but had only two over six innings.
“Maybe I didn’t have the swing-and-miss stuff that I wanted, but hitting spots was the biggest thing today,” said Burns. “The game plan was to not get beat by one guy. Let them put the ball in play and get themselves out.
“When I wasn’t getting strikeouts with the slider, (catcher Jose) Trevino told me, ‘Hey, man, don’t get mad because you are getting outs,” he added.
But the way things have gone for the Reds these days, Shewmake’s solo homer in the fifth could have been the one guy beating him.
“I gave up that homer, but the team picked me up,” said Chase. “I needed to go out there and give ‘em a shutdown inning and that’s what I did.”
But he tempted baseball fate after his teammates picked him up with three runs by giving up the leadoff double the next inning to Alvarez.
He followed the double by getting a fly ball from Isaac Paredes, a foul pop from Christian Walker and the strikeout of Cam Smith.
“I don’t want to start off any inning with a double, but just by bearing down and executing those pitches — I faced Cam Smith in college and he’s a good hitter, I just knew I had to make that pitch to get out of that inning and I got fired up with that strikeout to get out of that inning.”
The Reds decisive inning began with Nathaniel Lowe striking out against Houston starter Spencer Arrighetti, who came into the game 4-0 with a 1.96 earned run average.
Two years ago, the Reds scored nine runs on six hits and three walks in the first inning against Arrighetti. He recorded only two outs.
On Saturday, though, the Reds had only one hit against him in four innings.
After he struck out Lowe to open the fifth, he gave up a single to Sal Stewart and he promplty stole second base. Will Benson walked on a full count.
And that’s when Cam Smith dropped the fly ball, followed by McLain’s decisive two-run single.
“Tough stretch, but it’s behind us,” said McLain, who has been in some tough stretches himself most of ths season. “It was a good team win today.”
McLain said he wasn’t looking for the sweeper that Arrighetti gave him, “Just for something out over (the plate) and he left it over the middle and I put a good swing on it.”
Burns, though, was the main man of the day.
He put two runners on in the first inning, but picked Jose Altuve off first base and ended the inning with a double play ball.
He gave up a two-out double to Zach Cole in the second, but coaxed an inning-ennding grounder.
He walked Alvarez to open the fourth, then went 1-2-3, ending the inning with his first strtikeout, whiffing Smith, the victim of both Burns’ strikeouts.
He gave up the homer in the fifth and the leadoff double to Alvarez in the sixth, but showed his mature moxie by escaping each time.
“Chase came out and pitched really well,” said McLain. “Chase is a stud. We all see it, we all knew before seeing him come up quickly through the minor leagues and in spring training. Now it’s great to see him do it on the big stage.”