Reds complete sweep against Nationals

After big hits, Todd Frazier will often pantomime turning a steering wheel — he's driving the bus, if you will. This weekend, Frazier's bus ran over the Washington Nationals.

Frazier was 3 for 4 with a double and his second homer of the series in Sunday's 8-2 victory over the Nationals, as the Reds swept Washington in the three-game series.

After losing 10 of 11 games, which included a nine-game losing streak, the Reds responded by sweeping the National League East-leading Nationals in three games started by Reds rookie pitchers, breaking a streak of nine series wins by Washington.

Much of that came from the bat of Frazier, who hit his 16th home run of the season in the fourth inning and was one Denard Span web gem away from homering in all three games of the series. He finished the series 8 for 12 with five runs, three RBI, three doubles and two homers.

Frazier has a couple of different celebrations and he had plenty of opportunities to use them against the Nationals.

"It's a whole bunch of things, Skip (Schumaker) told me make a 'C' for captain," Frazier said. "It's also for the University of Cincinnati, kind of a UC thing — and then the other one is riding the bus, just get on the bus and hop on."

Frazier may have been driving, but he wasn't the only one supplying gas on Sunday. Brandon Phillips broke an 0-for-18 skid in the fifth inning with his third home run of the season and had the first of the Reds' five hits with runners in scoring position in the decisive six-run seventh. In all, five different Reds notched RBI in the inning and every single member of the lineup contributed in the inning that turned a tie game into a blowout.

Reds starter Michael Lorenzen allowed just one hit in his 6 1/3 innings of work, but he walked six, including three in the seventh when he was replaced by J.J. Hoover. Hoover gave up a two-run single to Nationals left fielder Michael Taylor to tie the game, but the Reds got out of the inning on an unassisted double play by first baseman Joey Votto.

Marlon Byrd, who entered the game as part of the a double switch when Lorenzen was pulled from the game, started the inning off with a hustle infield single on a grounder to second.

Billy Hamilton was called on to sacrifice bunt, but couldn't get down his first two attempts. With two strikes, he popped up a bunt, but pitcher Aaron Barrett couldn't catch it. He opted for the force out at second. While that did take out the lead runner, it put the fastest man in baseball on first.

"Maybe the biggest thing in the inning was the fact that the pitcher dropped that bunt and that it put Billy on first base, instead of Marlon," Price said. "And then all the attention they had focused on him set the stage for what happened afterwards."

After Hamilton stole second, he was running on a pitch when Phillips grounded a ball that got by Nationals shortstop Ian Desmond, and scored easily.

That gave the Reds a 3-2 lead, something that was good enough, if not comfortable for the combination of Tony Cingrani and Aroldis Chapman out of the team's bullpen.

But the Reds didn't stop at a mere one-run lead.

Votto walked (on just three balls because of a mistake by home plate umpire Paul Emmel) and then Frazier doubled to make it 4-2. Jay Bruce followed with a double to make it 6-2. After intentionally walking Zack Cozart, pinch-hitter Brennan Boesch singled to make it 7-2. And then Tucker Barnhart singled to make it 8-2.

Finally, Byrd, who started it all (and was the first out), hit into a double play to end the inning.

The Reds, who have been baseball's worst team as far as batting average with runners in scoring position, finished the series against the Nationals 12 for 28 with runners in scoring position — and won all three games.

"That old saying hitting is contagious, same kind of thing goes with runners in scoring position, everybody relaxes, understands that we don't need to get outside our strike zone and let the pitch come to you and attack," Frazier said. "That's all I told everybody, just attacking the ball, squaring it up and you'll have better opportunities. Even if you're off balance sometimes it works."

Lost among the offensive output was another fantastic outing by Lorenzen, who is now 1-1 with a 2.45 ERA in his five starts in the big leagues. Lorenzen struggled at times with his control, walking a total of six, including two batters on eight straight pitches in the first, but did allow just a single hit over his 6 1/3 innings. He struck out four and at one point retired 12 straight batters, needing just 33 pitches to do that from the third through the sixth innings.

Lorenzen didn't get the win, further showing the irrelevance of pitcher's wins as a statistical judgement of player performance, but he pitched masterfully at times and was as big a reason as any for the Reds' victory. In just five starts, Lorenzen has pitched at least six innings and allowed three hits or fewer three times, tied for the most in baseball among rookie pitchers with teammate Anthony DeSclafani, Friday's winner.

Add Raisel Iglesias' performance on Saturday into the mix, and the Reds showed signs of life not just for the future, but also the present. The Reds team that was pronounced dead earlier in the week, showed signs of life, and that's a good thing as the team closes out the second month of the season.

"Look around baseball and you see some teams that had — maybe not a run of losing 10 of 11 — but some lost six, seven or eight in a row and certain times during the year. You know, it happens," Reds manager Bryan Price said. "You just don't believe it's really happening when you're in it. I think we all know we have more talent here than a team that's several games under .500. that being said, we just turned it around against a really nice club. We have to continue that, not take anything for granted, go out there on the road and play better than we have on the road."