Reds win suspended game before beating Cardinals again

CINCINNATI If the Cardinals were to play 10 total innings on Saturday, they basically knew they were going to lose two games.

They dropped a 4-2 decision to Cincinnati on a two-run, eighth-inning homer by Adam Duvall in the completion of a game that had been suspended by rain in the top of the eighth inning on Friday.

Then, after playing only 11/2 innings to finish up that contest, the Cardinals lasted just 81/2 in the scheduled game.

Former Cardinal Skip Schumaker’s three-run homer, his first of the season, off Lance Lynn and a third excellent start against the Cardinals by Cincinnati rookie Anthony DeSclafani provided a 5-1 win for the Reds. Cincinnati has won the first three games of this four-game series by holding the Cardinals to three runs while scoring 20.

The Cardinals, making the National League Central Division race much more challenging lately, have lost eight of 10, scoring 23 runs in those 10 games. And there has been little to fault in the starting pitching the last two games, with John Lackey giving up two runs in seven innings on Friday and Lynn three runs and only four hits on Saturday.

After the first three Cardinals hit safely in the first inning, they had only two other hits after that and fanned a total of 13 times on a mostly drizzly day. Michael Wacha (15-5) looks to be the stopper on Sunday.

Cardinals manager Mike Matheny, after swallowing the double dose of medicine, said, “This happens. There are times you all have seen it and so have we when things are going exactly how you want them. And there’s times things are going exactly how the other guy wants them.

“When those times intersect, that usually turns into bad results. And that’s where we are. It happens to every club sometime during the season and it just happens to fall on us right now.”

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