Cueto Dominates Pirates in Reds Shutout Win.

The “vintage” Johnny Cueto was back tonight as he rolled through the Pittsburgh Pirates lineup going eight scorless innings allowing only one hit in a Reds 6-0 win over Pirates Friday night in Pittsburgh.

Cueto only inning of trouble was in the first inning where he walked and hit a batter. But he was able to wiggly his way out of trouble and the Pirates had only one baserunner after that. Johnny is now 8-2 lifetime in PNC Park with sub 2.30 ERA safe to say he loves to pitch in this pitching friendly ballpark that is PNC.

He faced the minimum number of batters. The first hit he allowed was in the fifth inning to Brandon Inge as he singled to left with one out before that he thought he struck him out looking as the pitch was called a ball and it was clearly a strike  so if that happened maybe Johnny was  in no hitter alert but that’s just being caught up in the moment. Reds defense was in full display tonight mostly notably Todd Frazier who had two nice plays in the hot corner.

Game was scoreless until the fourth as Jay Bruce who has struggled in his career against Pirates starter Wandy Rodriguez hit a solo homerun to right field for his eighth homerun of the year to give the Reds a 1-0 lead.

In the sixth, Brandon Phillips lined a ball to left that just cleared the wall for his ninth homerun of the year and a 2-0 lead. Phillips now takes the National league lead in RBI’s with 44.

Reds added four more runs in innings 8th and 9th to give Johnny some cushion. With the win Reds leap over the Pirates into 2nd place in the National League Central Division and trail the Cardinals by 1.5 games. Mike Leake takes the mound tomorrow night he will be opposed by Pirates Francisco Lirano. First pitch is at 7:15pm it will be on FOX .