CINCINNATI — It's one thing to sweep the Washington Nationals. It's a little tougher to beat the first-place Cincinnati Reds.
Jay Bruce, batting leadoff for the first time this season, belted three homers for the first time in his career and matched a personal best with five RBIs to power the Reds to a 7-1 victory over the Cubs on Friday night and hand manager Mike Quade his first loss in four games at the helm.
"A power-hitting guy and he winds up in the leadoff spot and does that," Quade said. "Bunt the ball or something, would you?"
Quade, who took over Monday for Lou Piniella, said he wasn't superstitious, but didn't want to talk about winning streaks by other Cubs managers prior to the game.
"The kids played great in Washington," Quade said of the team's three-game sweep, "but this is a little different animal here. I would prefer to try to win one game tonight against a very good ballclub."
Bruce and Johnny Cueto (12-4) made it tough. With the loss, the Cubs dropped to 3-11 against the Reds this season. The good news? This is the last series the two teams will play this year. The bad news is they still have to deal with Bruce for two more games. He hit a solo homer in the third and a three-run shot in the fifth off Tom Gorzelanny (7-8), then added another solo blast in the seventh off rookie Scott Maine.
Bruce had three home runs in 21 games in August prior to Friday. This was not the first three-homer game by a Reds player against the Cubs this year. Drew Stubbs clubbed three July 4 at Wrigley Field.
Gorzelanny had served up seven home runs in his 25 other games this year, so the long balls were a surprise.
"I focus on trying to keep the ball down and get guys to ground out," he said, "and [I] haven't given up too many long balls."
But Bruce connected on a hanging slider and a "fastball that decided to stay right in the middle of the plate," Gorzelanny said.
"Good hitters hit those balls, and you can't always get away with bad pitches," Gorzelanny said. "You make mistakes and you pay, especially in this league."
In Gorzelanny's past four starts against the Reds, the lefty had given up seven earned runs over 26 2/3 innings, but on Friday, they scored six off him in five innings.
"Nothing worked for me today," Gorzelanny said. "I made bad pitches and got behind guys and didn't execute my pitches. It's just a real bad outing."
Cueto scattered six hits over eight innings and picked up the win for the Reds, who maintained a four-game lead over the Cardinals in the National League Central.
"He had good stuff today — good location, good fastball, good movement," Chicago's Alfonso Soriano said. "When a guy's pitching with that command, there's nothing we can do."
Cincinnati struck in the first on Joey Votto's RBI single, which raised his season total to 91 RBIs, and made it 2-0 after Bruce connected with one out in the third.
With two outs in the Chicago fourth, Xavier Nady singled and scored on Tyler Colvin's double. That was it against Cueto.
"We never got anything going," Nady said. "With [Cueto], you have to hopefully get a couple baserunners and build off that."
Stubbs doubled to lead off the Cincinnati fifth, Paul Janish walked, and one out later, Bruce launched homer No. 15, and his second of the game, into the right-field seats to make it 5-1. Six pitches later, second baseman Chris Valaika hit his first Major League homer.
"[The Reds] this year … everything is perfect for them," Soriano said. "For us, everything is worse. For them, everything's perfect. They put a guy, first day as a leadoff hitter, and he hits three homers. They put a guy at second base, he goes 2-for-4, double, homer. We've got to concentrate and come back and try to win tomorrow."
Quade was the first Cubs skipper to win his first three games since Jim Riggleman went 4-0 in 1995. His players sounded as if they expected him to go unbeaten the rest of the way.
"[The Reds] are a good team and playing good baseball right now," Gorzelanny said, "but I also think they're a team we can beat regularly. They're a good team and have been a good team all year. I feel that us, as a team, could go out there and beat them the rest of the year. They're in a better situation than us right now."
Yes, they are.