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3 Runs Plenty For Oswalt

By C. Trent Rosecrans

Cincinnati Post

5/3/07

HOUSTON -- As Kyle Lohse walked through the Minute Maid Park clubhouse doors and out to meet his family, Reds right fielder Ken Griffey Jr. pulled someone aside.

"Can I say one thing? That guy," Griffey said as he pointed toward Lohse, "pitched his ass off even though he didn't have his best stuff."

Best stuff? Lohse didn't really even have his average stuff on Wednesday night and put his team down two runs after just four pitches against a pitcher with unprecedented success against the Reds.

When Lohse left the game after six innings, he'd given up eight hits, but just three runs. That was enough for the Astros to claim a 3-1 victory and give starter Roy Oswalt an 18-1 career record against the Reds. But at least Lohse gave his team a shot.

"You don't want to put your team in a hole early like that; it's a struggle to get back in the game like that," Lohse said. "That hurt. The way he was throwing the ball, it seemed like one run was enough."

It wasn't, but two was.

Adam Dunn hit a solo home run to lead off the fifth inning for the first Reds hit of the game, but Dunn's eighth home run of the season was the only one the Reds would get -- even though from the third inning to the sixth inning, they got at least one runner on base.

Lohse gave up a leadoff double to Craig Biggio, a triple to Hunter Pence and an RBI single by Lance Berkman, all in the first four pitches of the bottom of the first inning.

"Obviously their game plan was to come out and attack what I've been doing," Lohse said. "I've been trying to get ahead, but they weren't quality pitches and that was the problem. If I get them down a little better, a couple of those might be outs."

After the game, Lohse watched video of the first inning and said he saw something mechanically he was doing differently, and hopefully he can fix it for the next time he pitches.

"You're trying to focus and get back to what you do," Lohse said. "I know it's there, but at the same time I don't want to leave one right up the middle. We kind of had to pitch backwards and use the fastball later in the counts. It was a battle."

Lohse survived the first by getting Luke Scott to pop out to third baseman Ryan Freel in foul territory and then shortstop Adam Everett popped up to Lohse to end the inning and give Oswalt a two-run lead.

Oswalt's domination of the Reds is well documented. He set a major league record by beating the Reds in his first 15 decisions against the team in his career. Cincinnati finally got to him last April, but he then went out and beat the Reds the next two times he faced them.

As good as Oswalt has been against the Reds, he was even better on Wednesday night. Oswalt threw 95 pitches, of which 74 were strikes. He walked one batter and struck out two.

"It looked like tonight he had no-hitter stuff, he was in a zone," said Reds first baseman Scott Hatteberg, who entered the game with a career .455 mark against Oswalt but went 0-for-4 on Wednesday. "He's got that mentality that he's coming right after you and next thing you know you're down 0-2, 1-2, whatever and he just puts you away. Tonight he was working both sides of the plate and establishing his fastball."

That's something Lohse wasn't able to do, even though he tried early. After the Astros pounced on his fastball early, he started using his off-speed pitches early in the count and going to his fastball later.

"I was all over the place with my fastball tonight, the whole time," Lohse said. "It was just a battle every inning not to give in and make pitches when I had to. It seemed like every time I turned around, I had runners in scoring position and I couldn't let them keep putting runs up there because Roy Oswalt's pitching."

Only in the fifth inning did Lohse not allow a runner past first base. In the third inning, he had runners on second and third before striking out Everett to end the inning. He finished with four strike outs, three walks and a hit batter.

In the sixth inning, Lohse walked catcher Brad Ausmus, who scored on Biggio's single. That was the only inning the Astros didn't strand a runner on the bases.

"In the past, I would have given up more runs," Lohse said. "I was bearing down and it seemed like every inning they had a guy on second and they were one hit away from giving Oswalt three-, four-run leads. That's not what you want to do. I was bearing down and I wasn't my sharpest today, but I got by."

Lohse will have another chance to try to tame the Astros and Oswalt on Monday night, when the two will meet again at Great American Ball Park.

"Lucky me," Lohse said. "The good thing is they haven't seen my best stuff."