After giving up a single run in the first inning last night, Roy Oswalt shut down the Reds over the next six, picking up the win. I know, I know, it was really quite shocking. In his 27th career appearance against the Reds, he improved to an amazing 22-1. That's not a typo: twenty-two and one!

Here's John Fay of the Cincinnati Enquirer (before the win was officially wrapped up) trying to wrap his head around Oswalt's pure and utter domination:

Studying the numbers from Oswalt v. Reds, it's hard to understand how he's 21-1. He was great against the Reds in his first three starts -- 23 innings, one run. Since then, he's been good. He has a 3.08 ERA. That's only slightly better than his career ERA of 3.19. But he's 102-62 against the rest of baseball. That's a .621 percentage. Again, good. But not an other-worldly .955.

How good is .955? The next best by someone with 20 decisions or more against the Reds is .696 (16-7 by Bob Welch).

Looking at Oswalt's 27 games as a whole, he's posted a 2.50 ERA against the Reds. In his 23 games against the Pirates, on the other hand, he's posted a similar 2.57 ERA but has a relatively pedestrian 11-6 record to show for it. Obviously there's some luck at play, but it makes you wonder if he has something against the fair city of Cincinnati. Did he eat a bad batch of Skyline Chili? Did Pete Rose welch on a bet? Did Carson Palmer fail him in his fantasy football playoffs? What's the deal?