After losing a bunch of games scoring seven or more runs, the Astros would have liked to have had a few of those runs tonight. The no-name pitching staff did its job, but the offense could only manage five hits on a Rockies bullpen night.
The Astros struck early against Rockies opener Juan Mejia. It would be their only runs all night. Jose Altuve led off the Astros’ first with a single, followed by two bloop singles by Yordan Alvarez and Joey Loperfido, giving the Astros a 2-0 lead.
The Rockies got one back in the third, but it could have been worse. Astros rookie Ryan Weiss, in his first start, walked the first three batters, but a double play and a pop-up limited the damage to one run.
Weiss wasn’t as lucky in the fourth inning as Hunter Goodman crushed a lead-off homer to deep left center field. In 12 games against the Astros, Goodman has smacked seven homers. He was 3-4 tonight.
The Rockies took the lead in the fifth inning on a Tyler Freeman RBI single off Astros reliever Christian Roa. Roa escaped further trouble when Goodman (again) doubled, but Freeman was thrown out at home on a relay strike delivered with assassin accuracy by Carlos Correa.
The Astros mounted a threat in their sixth inning after an Isaac Paredes walk and a Correa double put runners on second and third with no outs. But a Christian Walker groundout, and Joey Loperfido and Cam Smith strikeouts extinguished the threat.
The Astros may have wished they had taken it a little easier on Rockies starter Mejia in the first inning because they couldn’t do anything against his replacement, Chase Dollander, for the next 5.1 innings. Dollander hit 100 on the radar gun while striking out nine, allowing only one hit.
In the seventh inning, the Rocks loaded the bases with one out against A.J. Blubaugh with slugger Goodman at the plate. A.J. got him out for the only time tonight on strikes and then got Mickey Moniak to ground out to Jose Altuve on a spectacular play at second. Reports of Altuve’s demise as a defensive second baseman may have been exaggerated.
In the seventh inning, with two outs, the Astros again loaded the bases after an Altuve double, an intentional walk to Yordan, and an eight-pitch walk to Paredes. Unfortunately, Carlos Correa lined out to first to strand another three runners.
Following Blubaugh, Kai-Wei Teng quickly dispatched the Rockies in the eighth and ninth innings, keeping the game close for the top of the Astros order in the ninth. Unfortunately, the first batter was #9 Yainer Diaz, who swung at two balls out of the zone and grounded out on an outside slider. Can’t blame it all on Diaz, who was 0-4. After an Altuve walk, Alvarez lined out to right field, and Paredes flied out to the warning track in left field.
The Astros were 2-10 with runners in scoring position and left ten runners on base.
It feels inevitable that the Astros bats would cool off, as we have seen in the last two games. At least, the pitching has improved at the same time.
The Astros take on the Cardinals tomorrow at 7:10 CT.
We had enough opportunities to win this game, but the crucial hit didn’t happen. Weiss’ walks are exasperating.
The lack of control will limit Weiss and the success he is looking for. He is basically no more than a Brandon Beilak type. Lacking proper control, his put-away pitch just doesn’t put anybody away as well. I may have believed too early about him
The one saving grace I have watching the Astros this year is that the rest of the AL is a hodgepodge of mediocrity. Literally, any team is a contender in the AL this year. WIth this being said, seeing that the Mariners are 4-12 against everyone not named the Astros, it’s hard for me to get excited about the Astros right now seeing how bad the Mariners beat them last weekend. I’m hopeful the pitching gets straightened out. It can’t be this bad, can it?