CINCINNATI _ Friday's game took place on the road and after the All-Star game. Those factors have portended danger for Ivan Nova this season. Friday was no different.
Nova struggled again during a 9-5 loss to the Cincinnati Reds at Great American Ball Park. The Pirates (61-68) lost for the 10th time in 13 games and for the ninth time in 11 games against the Reds this season.
Nova (11-11) allowed seven runs, five of them earned, and eight hits in five innings. He gave up his 24th and 25th home runs allowed this season in his fifth and final inning. After walking two or fewer batters in his first 23 starts, he has walked three men in two of his past three. In eight games since the All-Star break, Nova has allowed 63 hits in 45 innings and has a 6.00 ERA.
Nova has started 15 games on the road this season. In those starts he has a 4.75 ERA and 109 hits allowed in 962/3 innings. He has a 2.87 ERA in 69 innings at PNC Park.
Eugenio Suarez doubled in the second. Scott Schebler then snuck a ball past Josh Bell that rattled around the right-field corner for an RBI triple. That was the beginning of a big night for Schebler. He singled during the Reds' two-run fourth, during which four batters in a row reached base after Josh Harrison's error. Nova struck out three in a row after that, all on curveballs, but he also bounced a curveball away from Chris Stewart and allowed a run to score.
Adam Duvall had already homered in the fifth when Schebler came to the plate with a man aboard. He took a first-pitch fastball, up in the zone and over the outer half of the plate, out to center field to give the Reds a 7-2 lead.
Reds starter Robert Stephenson began Friday's game by striking out the first six batters he faced. Nine of the first 11 outs he recorded came via a strikeout. His cutter and changeup moved in opposite directions, always near the bottom of the strike zone, and made contact elusive.
Francisco Cervelli's leadoff walk in the third led to the Pirates' first run. Two outs later, Starling Marte and Adam Frazier singled. Cervelli scored from second on Frazier's hit, but the run came at a price. Cervelli injured his left quadriceps and left the game.
Stephenson surrendered another run in the fourth. After Bell singled, John Jaso lofted a fly ball to the warning track in left-center field. Billy Hamilton had a read on it, but stumbled as he approached the track and the ball dropped for an RBI double.
Bell pulled the Pirates back within range in the seventh with a three-run homer on a full-count pitch from Tim Adleman. But Daniel Hudson walked a batter and hit two more in the bottom half, and A.J. Schugel allowed two inherited runners to score.
Stephenson (2-4) struck out 11 in 52/3 innings. He allowed two runs and seven hits. The Pirates will face another young starter Saturday, righty Luis Castillo, a 24-year-old rookie who has a 3.45 ERA in 12 starts.
Pirates manager Clint Hurdle offered an impressive scouting report on Castillo, who has 74 strikeouts in 701/3 innings: a fastball that sits 96 to 98 mph, a two-seamer that runs in on righties, a changeup he uses against lefties and a slider he throws to right-handers. And unlike most pitchers, against whom the Pirates want to force pitches high enough in the zone to hit, they want to wait until Castillo, who sometimes works at the top of the zone, puts one below their hands.
