ATLANTA – Just when it looked like the Cincinnati Reds might salvage a week of troubled waters in Atlanta with a big home run and a series split, they imploded in the bottom of the ninth inning Thursday, then lost in an ugly 11th that cost them ejections of both their first-base coach and manager, before embarking on what might have been the longest flight from Atlanta to Houston in baseball history.
After Rece Hinds delivered a two-run homer in the ninth to give the Reds the lead, Graham Ashcraft walked the leadoff man, gave up a hit off Hinds’ wayward glove in right, surrendered a run-scoring squeeze bunt followed by a Little League sequence on a tying single to left by Michael Harris II.
Left-fielder Gavin Lux made an ill-advised throw to the plate, allowing the potential winning run to take second, and when the throw skipped past the plate for an error, Harris took third.
Ashcraft rallied for a strikeout and grounder to send the game to the 10th.
But then came a wild sequence in the top of the 11th, with Blake Dunn bunting into a fielder’s choice to lead off the inning that wiped out the extra-inning gift runner on a play at third. One out later, Dunn was called out on a steal attempt, his helmet flying in front of the tag and second-baseman Ozzie Albies appearing to block the bag with his leg.
That enraged first-base coach Collin Cowgill, who got tossed for arguing just ahead of a “call-stands” challenge by the Reds, which brought manager Terry Francona into the fray, where he got ejected.
By the time Drake Baldwin singled home the game winner with two out in the bottom of the inning it seemed like all but a formality.
Until the ninth, the Reds looked like they might survive a week of adversity against a surging Braves team projected to battle for a playoff spot again.
The day after losing Hunter Greene to a groin injury, No. 2 starter Nick Lodolo answered with six strong innings, allowing two runs on five hits and retiring 12 straight batters at one point.
He struck out seven without a walk in six innings and handed off a 2-2 game after the Reds tied it in a long seventh inning.
The Reds squandered a chance at a taking the lead in the seventh after loading the bases with one out after a pair of walks sandwiched around a Jose Trevino double.
That brought up the top of the order and a Braves pitching change to match left-hander Dylan Lee against lefty hitting TJ Friedl (who’d homered twice the night before).
Friedl drove home the tying run with a sharp single to right just over the first baseman, but the wheels-challenged Trevino running from second was held at third.
Lee then struck out both Matt McLain and Elly De La Cruz to leave the bases loaded.
The only runs Lodolo allowed were the result of pairs of back-to-back hits in the first and fifth.
A Matt Olson sacrifice fly drove home the first one for a 1-0. And after a one-out bunt single by Eli White in the fifth, Michael Harris II tripled to right for a 2-1 lead.
The Red snapped a nine-inning scoreless drought in the top of fifth on a pair of single leading off the inning and a one-out double by Trevino.
This article originally appeared on Cincinnati Enquirer: Cincinnati Reds lose again to Atlanta Braves