None of it stopped Arizona from finishing the job. Cincinnati's third-inning outburst held up as the game's only scoring for the better part of five innings, but the Diamondbacks chipped away with a run in the sixth before breaking it open with four in the seventh — the sequence that decided the finale and closed out the set for the home club.
Arizona still has real stakes attached to this stretch — the Diamondbacks came into the weekend a couple games back of the final NL Wild Card spot, which made a series against a scuffling-then-surging Reds club exactly the kind they couldn't afford to give away. Cincinnati's own math is longer, but Bleday's cycle and the week's run of tight, one-run wins had at least put a scare into the division before Sunday put a stop to it.
Bratt's assignment fit the pattern Arizona has leaned on all month — plug a command lefty in behind Eduardo Rodriguez, Brandon Pfaadt and Merrill Kelly and let him eat innings while the rehab list slowly empties. Cincinnati got scoreless innings out of its own bridge deep into the game before that four-run seventh broke through, the same formula manager Terry Francona has leaned on while trying to protect an offense he's called short on chances to spread the damage around.
Arizona banks the finale and keeps its Wild Card hopes alive; Cincinnati heads home still chasing the kind of complementary bullpen day that turned this set's blowout win into Sunday's letdown.