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CINCINNATI (AP) -- Even when they spot the opposition a four-length lead right out of the gate, the Cincinnati Reds know how to imitate Secretariat.
On a balmy Wednesday night in Great American Ball Park, it looked as if the four-game winning streak to start the 2011 season might come to a thumping conclusion when the Houston Astros scored four runs before the Reds took their first turn in the batter's box.
Child's play, mere child's play for this team that seemingly has discovered every plausible way to win a baseball game.
The Reds scored 12 unanswered runs after starter Edinson Volquez fell behind, 4-0, in the first inning and the Reds are now 5-0.
Volquez started on Opening Day against Milwaukee and gave up three in the first, but the Reds won that one on Ramon Hernandez's three-run walk-off home run in the bottom of the ninth.
The Reds made certain this night it wouldn't take any late-game histrionics. With a run in the second and five in the third, the Reds wiped away Volquez's sins and never glanced backward.
After giving up three walks and three hits in the first, Volquez survived the five innings necessary to earn the win, holding the winless Astros (0-5) to no runs, one hit and two walks over the his final four innings, retiring 10 of the last 13 batters he faced.
In the first two innings, Volquez struck out six -- getting every out he recorded via a whiff. And that, said manager Dusty Baker, was his mistake.
"They didn't get to him in the first inning, he got to himself," said Baker. "We talked to him early because he was throwing the ball great. Those first two innings he had six strikeouts but he was more dependent on strikeouts than his defense.
"He was throwing all his pitches when it wasn't necessary to throw all his pitches," Baker added. "He was throwing every pitch he had to every batter in the first inning, showing everything he had."
Volquez was armed with a 96 and 97 miles-per-hour fastball, "And they were late on it, but then he'd throw something else. He was just trying to pitch. That happens sometimes with young guys. They don't want to be just known as a thrower, they want to be known as a pitcher."
The problem with that is that the pitch-count mounts and, sure enough, by the end of the fifth Volquez was at 99 pitches and the meter was expired.
"He settled down after the second inning and had only one more strikeout but a whole lot more outs and a whole lot less baserunners," said Baker. "What this tells him is that he is throwing too many pitches. He should be getting into the seventh or eighth with the stuff he has versus just getting into the fifth or sixth -- a very laborious five or six innings."
Volquez knows it. Can he apply it?
"I just needed to throw more strikes, which is what I did after the first batter in the second inning," he said.
After his Jagged Edge first inning, 44 pitches of agony, Volquez walked the first batter in the second on four pitches, earning him a visit from pitching coach Bryan Price.
Price's message was succinct and the word 'strikes' was prominently uttered. Message heard. Volquez struck out the next three.
"I thought they'd be taking me out because I was throwing too many pitches, but Dusty told me when I was sitting on the bench, 'Forget about the strikeouts and make better pitches to get ground balls and fly balls for some quick innings.
"Bryan Price told me it's good to get a lot of strikeouts, but it's bad because you make a lot of pitches," Volquez added.
He, of course, was saved by the Reds' rip-roarin' offense, which has scored 43 runs in the first five games, second highest in team history for the first five games. The 1976 Big Red Machine scored 44, and everybody knows where that team ended up.
Shortstop Paul Janish, known to carry gold in his glove but zircon in his bat, is quickly showing that he won't be an offensive burden when he is in the lineup.
He had three hits and drove in two runs and is batting .444. Scott Rolen had only one hit, but drove home three and Brandon Phillips had three hits and scored three runs.
"Right now, we're clicking," said Janish. "Volquez struggled in that first inning, but he fought through five innings and that was big. We jumped right back at 'em in the third inning to take the lead."
After scoring one in the second, the Reds scored five in the third to take a 6-4 lead with Rolen driving home two with a double and Janish pushing another across with a single.
"I had a good spring training and felt good coming into the season," said Janish. "It is good to get off to a good start, even as early as it is in the season, and it beats going oh-fer, right?
"The thing is, it isn't just me," Janish added. "It's the whole team. And it has just sort of snowballed." This snowball is fast approaching avalanche proportions.
