CINCINNATI -- Nick Lodolo wasn't thrilled with his command during the first few innings vs. the Giants on Saturday afternoon, but once the Reds' lefty starter found a workable adjustment, he discovered another gear. Then Lodolo put his defense to work.
Lodolo delivered six innings and got a timely home run from Christian Encarnacion-Strand in the bottom of the sixth for Cincinnati's 3-2 victory over San Francisco.
"Command was nowhere to be found," said Lodolo, who gave up two earned runs and five hits with no walks and one strikeout. "I started lining up better as I got my legs under me as the game kept going. But even then, it¡¯s not how you draw up the command that you think you¡¯re going to put it where you want. I just battled."
Lodolo threw 86 pitches (56 strikes), but after throwing 57 through his first three innings, he needed only 29 over his last three. Over those fourth, fifth and sixth innings, he retired eight of nine batters while facing the minimum.
San Francisco struck first in the second inning when Wilmer Flores hit Lodolo's 0-1 fastball to left field for a one-out solo home run. The deficit was 2-0 in the third inning after Heliot Ramos led off with a double to left field and scored on Jung Hoo Lee's RBI single into right field.
Then Lodolo shut down the Giants while retiring the next nine in a row as the Reds battled back.
"Instead of trying to fight to get to a pitch, I wanted to just go with what I had," Lodolo said. "I was just trying to get outs any way I could there. I was able to start sinking the ball and throw a changeup as the game went on."
Lodolo needed only eight pitches to cruise through the top of the fifth inning. Then, Matt McLain delivered a two-out double to right-center field in the bottom of the fifth off likely future Hall of Famer Justin Verlander and scored on Elly De La Cruz's game-tying RBI single to right field.
"You¡¯re looking up, and it looks like Lodolo might be [done after] five," Reds manager Terry Francona said. "But he had such a good inning, he could go out for the sixth, and it does change things."
All but one of Lodolo's outs in the final four innings were via groundballs. It included a nifty diving stop by the second baseman, McLain, who went to his left on the grass to rob Lee of a hit in the sixth.
"The lefties rolled over on him a lot, and the righties hit groundballs up the middle -- and they like to go straight up to second base," said McLain, who was 2-for-4 with two runs scored, including a third-inning solo homer against Verlander. "You¡¯ve got to be locked in."
McLain¡¯s play proved important as next batter Matt Chapman hit a single. But Lodolo got Flores to ground into an inning-ending 6-4-3 double play to escape.
"I was getting better direction to the plate. The command was starting to come back to me a little bit. That was the big part of it," Lodolo said. "Overall, I kind of settled into the game a little bit. You¡¯re amped up at the beginning, first start of the year."
Against Giants reliever Spencer Bivens, Encarnacion-Strand's opposite-field drive into the visitors' bullpen in right field put Cincinnati ahead for good.
With the Reds¡¯ needing only nine outs from their bullpen instead of 12, Tony Santillan provided a scoreless seventh inning. Making his debut as a reliever, Graham Ashcraft allowed two hits in the eighth but also picked up the team's third double play to hold the lead.
One game after Ian Gibaut blew a save with a one-run lead in Thursday's Opening Day loss, Emilio Pag¨¢n got the chance to close and succeeded with a 1-2-3 ninth. The Reds¡¯ pitching staff fanned 17 batters Thursday and notched only one strikeout on Saturday.
"We¡¯ve got a lot of confidence in everybody in our bullpen," Pag¨¢n said. "It¡¯s unfortunate that Game 1 ended the way that it did. But we threw the ball really, really well on Opening Day. I think if we punch out 17 and walk two, we like our chances."
In the interview room as Francona spoke postgame, Pag¨¢n presented him with the ball from the game's final out. It commemorated his first win as manager of the Reds.
"You would think that after all these years ¡ I couldn¡¯t even breathe in the ninth inning," Francona said. "I showed up here this morning at quarter to nine, and all I wanted to do was win. So to hear music [in the clubhouse] is pretty cool."