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Giants begin final homestand of year against Reds

(Sports Network) - The San Francisco Giants will begin their final homestand of the season with the first of four straight meetings with the Cincinnati Reds tonight at AT&T Park.

The Giants return home having lost six of their last seven games, including the final two tests of a three-game set at Arizona to conclude their road trip. In Wednesday's rubber match, the Diamondbacks' Chris Snyder hit a go- ahead two-run double in the bottom of the fifth inning and Arizona held on for a 6-4 decision.

Randy Winn went 2-for-4 with a homer and three RBI for San Francisco, while Rajai Davis and Kevin Frandsen collected three hits each in a losing cause.

Barry Zito was hung with the defeat after the Giants starter allowed five runs on nine hits in just four-plus innings of work.

The Reds also enter this series in a bit of a tailspin, as the club has dropped four of its last five contests and is just 2-5 on its current 10-game road trip.

Cincinnati is coming off Wednesday's 3-2 loss in Chicago, with the Cubs scoring the tie-breaking run on Matt Murton's eighth-inning fielder's choice.

Adam Dunn clubbed his 40th homer of the season for the Reds and Edwin Encarnacion also went deep for Cincinnati, but right fielder Ken Griffey Jr. had to leave the game in the bottom of the eighth due to an abdominal strain. The star slugger will return to Cincinnati today to be examined by team doctors.

Rookie Tom Shearn held Chicago to two runs on six hits over the first six innings. Gary Majewski suffered the loss after being charged with an unearned run and recorded only one out in the eighth.

Tonight's contest features a pair of promising young right-handers, as 22- year-old Matt Cain takes the mound for the Giants opposite Reds rookie Homer Bailey.

Bailey will be making his first major league appearance since July 7, when he limited Arizona to just one run and two hits in a five-inning no decision. The former first-round pick was then sent back to the minors with the expectation to be recalled after the All-Star break, but Bailey strained his groin shortly after the demotion and was sidelined for more than a month.

The highly-regarded 21-year-old went 2-2 with a 6.99 earned run average in six starts for the Reds before being sent down, but he yielded two runs or less in three of those outings. This will be Bailey's first-ever appearance against San Francisco.

Cain's season has been plagued by a number of tough-luck losses, the most recent of which came this past Saturday in San Diego. The hard-throwing righty allowed just a single hit in his six-inning stint against the Padres, but that runner came around to score and the Giants gave him zero run support in an eventual 6-0 defeat.

Cain is just 7-15 this year despite having posted a respectable 3.71 ERA in 30 starts. He has received a mere 3.51 runs per start, the second-lowest mark among major league hurlers.

He did get some offensive help in a victory over the Reds back in July, however. Cain allowed four runs and nine hits in just 5 2/3 innings during that game, but managed to get the win as San Francisco came away with a 9-5 decision.

The Reds wound up taking two of three games in that series with the Giants, but San Francisco is 11-5 in the last 16 matchups between the teams.

The Giants will wrap up their 2007 home schedule with three games against San Diego beginning Monday.

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