Reds vs. D-Backs, Game 3: Preview/Predictions

Over the past week, Jay Bruce has slowly transformed himself from fantastic right fielder into a character from a Matt Christopher novel. Meanwhile, the rest of the Reds lineup has resembled another completely fictional team. Today, the Reds will attempt to avoid dropping a third straight game to the Arizona Diamondbacks before Monday's off day. Meanwhile, Arizona hopes to expand upon its three game lead in the NL West.

If the Reds are going to avoid the sweep today, they'll need their stopper, Mat Latos, to be in his peak form. Latos sustained his first recorded loss in over twenty starts in his last outing. He'll look to begin a new streak against a Diamondbacks team that has gone 5-5 in their last ten games.

Latos will face off against Randall Delgado who will be making his second straight start in the Major Leagues. Delgado was called up early last week from AAA Reno to face off against another AAA team, the Miami Marlins. Delgado performed admirably enough, going seven innings and giving up only two runs, to warrant another start against Jay Bruce and the struggling Reds.

Latos will need his teammates to provide more run support than Reds starters have received over the past couple games. With Shin Soo Choo and Brandon Phillips slumping, the weight of the world is on Jay Bruce to get the Reds offense going. While Bruce's past seven hits have all been home runs, too many of those have come without anyone on base. Without slipping into an Adam Dunn comparison, I will say that the onus is on the hitters in front of him to get on base for Jay to continue his white hot streak when he makes contact with the baseball.

Losing in Arizona is terrible, if only for the fact that the only distraction when this happens is tHom waxing not-so-poetically about the dry heat and number of "quality Applebees" in the region. So, yeah, let's make sure we don't have to unmute the television in this series finale. Why? Because the Reds are my favorite team!