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  Friday, Apr. 7 7:05pm ET
Sosa snaps out of it with homer
 
  RECAP | BOX SCORE | GAME LOG

CINCINNATI (AP) -- Sammy Sosa visited Junior's new home and showed him how it's done.

Sosa hit a two-run homer deep to center field in his first at-bat and barely missed out on two more as the Chicago Cubs broke out of their offensive slump and beat the Cincinnati Reds 10-6 Friday night.

He outdid Ken Griffey Jr. in their first head-to-head meeting in the regular season since 1991, driving in three runs to jump-start Chicago's sluggish offense.

Sosa also had a sacrifice fly to the warning track in right and a fly out to the wall in left, hitting a ball hard to each field -- a sign that he's ready to get rolling.

"I'm starting to feel much better," said Sosa, who broke an 0-for-16 slump with his first homer of the season. "I'm starting to feel more comfortable, more patient.

"I was just trying to make contact, trying to get a good swing at the ball."

By contrast, Griffey went 0-for-4 and had a sacrifice fly with the bases loaded in the ninth that was little consolation. In five games for his hometown team, Griffey has gone 1-for-18 and gotten only two balls out of the infield.

On Friday, he struck out, grounded out twice and popped out, hearing a couple of boos for the first time. The crowd was up and screaming when he came to bat in the ninth against Mark Guthrie, a left-hander he has hit hard in the past.

Cubs manager Don Baylor knew that Griffey was 11-for-23 (.478) against Guthrie with two homers. Baylor also knew how much Griffey was struggling and went with the lefty-vs.-lefty matchup.

"I threw the stats away," Baylor said. "I knew Guthrie's numbers against Griffey were ugly. He's not swinging the bat as well as he can. He's just struggling right now. Anytime you can take advantage, you do."

Guthrie got Griffey on a routine fly to left that drove in Cincinnati's final run but got the Reds down to their final out. Rick Aguilera got his second save by getting Dante Bichette to hit into a forceout.

Sosa wasn't the only Cub to break out as Chicago emerged from a four-game losing streak. The Cubs scored a season-high in runs and Andrew Lorraine (1-0) beat the Reds for the first time in three career starts.

Lorraine did an impressive job against Griffey, who went 0-for-4 and didn't get a ball out of the infield against him.

"If you make a mistake over the plate, he's going to get you," Lorraine said. "Except for one mistake I made in his first at-bat that he swung at and missed, I gave him nothing to hit."

The Cubs hadn't won since beating the Mets 5-3 in their opener in Tokyo. Their offense was horrid during a three-game sweep in St. Louis, getting outscored 30-8, outhit 33-18 and outhomered 9-1.

It broke out against Pete Harnisch (0-1), who was pitching on three days' rest for the first time since June 1996.

Harnisch came back a day early after throwing 81 pitches -- 46 for strikes -- in Monday's opener, a 3-3 tie in the rain. He threw 80 pitches -- 45 for strikes -- in an almost identical performance that got far worse results.

The Cubs rolled up six runs over four innings off Harnisch. Sosa started it with a two-run homer that flew an estimated 448 feet to center. Griffey turned, took two small steps and watched the ball the rest of the way.

"They hit every mistake that I threw," Harnisch said. "I felt good about the way I threw the ball. It was the best breaking ball I've had in a long time. I don't know. You can chalk it up to me being (bad) or chalk it up to them hitting everything I threw."

Damon Buford homered leading off the second and Ricky Gutierrez broke it open with a two-run double as part of a three-run fourth. Mark Grace's two-run homer completed a four-run sixth off rookie Hector Mercado that made it 10-2.

The 36,383 fans came to see Sosa and Griffey, who hadn't played a regular-season game together since Oct. 6, 1991. Seattle beat Chicago 3-2 in that game, Sosa's last with the White Sox. Both were 0-for-1.

Griffey dug in a few minutes after Sosa circled the bases after his long homer in the first and seemed determined to duplicate it, swinging hard and empty three times as he struck out.

The Cubs copied Milwaukee's Griffey shift from the opening series, moving Gutierrez from his usual shortstop position to the other side of second. Griffey grounded out to Gutierrez in the third.

Griffey tried to go the other way and popped out and grounded out to third baseman Shane Andrews in his next two at-bats.

Sosa and Griffey had played against each other 27 times in the regular season. Both have homered twice in those games.

Game notes
Sosa also flew out to the wall in left in his final at-bat, finishing 1-for-4 with three RBI. ... Lorraine had been roughed up in his two previous career starts against the Reds, giving up eight runs in 8 1/3 innings. ... OF Deion Sanders, on the Reds' 15-day disabled list recovering from a sore ankle, will report to Triple-A Louisville in time for its home opener Wednesday. Sanders will play left field for a week and hopes to rejoin the Reds then. ... Cincinnati's D.T. Cromer had his third straight pinch single, leaving him 3-for-3 in the majors.

 


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