Holland’s solid outing not enough to beat Reds

CINCINNATI — Reds right-hander Dan Straily is on a roll, and it didn’t stop against the first-place Rangers on Tuesday night.

Straily, in a tight pitching matchup with left-hander Derek Holland, pitched six dominant innings, and the Reds held on for a 3-0 victory at Great American Ball Park. The Rangers have lost three straight, but remain 5 1/2 games up on the Mariners, who lost to the Yankees, 5-1, in the American League West with 36 to play.

“We haven’t gotten the hits when the team has needed them the most,” Rangers designated hitter Carlos Beltran said. “You go through that where you’re not getting the results. We are going through a little funk.”

The Reds, who have won six of their last eight, are 22-14 since the All-Star break — second-best in the National League — and Straily is one of the reasons. Straily held the Rangers to three hits, walked two and struck out five. He is now 6-0 with a 1.98 ERA in eight starts since the break, and the Reds have won all eight.

“I have a pretty good history with a lot of those guys,” said Straily, a former Athletics and Astros pitcher. “Sometimes, when you have enough history with people, you want to make sure you’re not doing the same thing repeatedly over and over. We had backup plans if they started to hit certain pitches. We never really had to go to those. Tucker [Barnhart, catcher] did a great job. We were in synch the whole night.”

Holland, making his first start since June 20, came off the disabled list and allowed just one run in six innings. He gave up four hits, walked one and struck out five on 73 pitches.

• Holland’s ‘tremendous’ return goes unrewarded

But the walk was costly. The game was scoreless in the sixth when Holland walked Tyler Holt to lead off the inning. Billy Hamilton bunted him to second and Joey Votto brought him home with a single to right.

Rangers pitchers walked three and all ended up scoring. Barnhart doubled home a run in the seventh and Votto had another RBI with a sacrifice fly in the eighth.

MOMENTS THAT MATTEREDHamilton’s golden defense: Leading off the sixth, Beltran drove a 1-0 fastball deep into the left-center gap. Using a first step of minus 0.03 seconds, a top speed of 22 mph and a route …

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