I attended my first baseball game of the season on Friday evening as the first place (central) Cincinnati Reds took on the first place (east) Atlanta Braves.  My mom bought a group of tickets earlier in the week, which was fortunate since the game did sell out.  It turns out that it was many of the group’s first game of the season, and the first for my mom in years.  I think she has only been to Great American Ballpark once before, and it’s been open now for over seven years.  I’ve been to more games than that, and I haven’t really lived near Cincinnati since shortly after the ballpark opened.  Either way, we all had a blast rooting for the home team.

We arrived at the stadium in the second inning, and after watching the scoreless second, the scoring started in the third.  Atlanta went on the scoreboard first, but the Reds quickly countered with three runs of their own in the bottom of the third.  The Braves added a couple more runs in the fifth and followed it with another in the sixth.  Down 4-3, Joey Votto came to the plate in the eight inning to deliver a solo home run to tie the game.  Things were looking up for the Reds, including a great catch by Chris Heisey that robbed Brooks Conrad of a home run of his own to end the top of the ninth.  After a scoreless bottom of the ninth, we were off to extra innings.  The tenth started off great for the Reds, and they quickly had two outs on the Braves.  But that’s where it all went south, as the Braves eventually scored a couple of runs before getting their third out.  The Reds managed to get a couple of guys on base in the bottom of the ninth, but eventually two strikeouts and a pop fly were enough for the Braves to claim victory.

The Reds went on to win the other two games of the series.  Unfortunately, St. Louis just won three in a row, and the Reds are now half a game out of first place behind the Cardinals.  I’m hoping to catch another Reds game next month when they come to Denver to take on the Rockies.