The Launch Angle

On the 10th anniversary of the Houston Astros getting Yordan Alvarez from the Los Angeles Dodgers, celebrating it with a commemorative bobblehead, the Astros win the season series in crushing fashion, winning 11-2 in the series opener again the Texas Rangers.

Houston got the scoring going early and didn’t stop for a little while. 

Three-straight hits from Taylor Trammell, Yainer Diaz and LaMonte Wade Jr. kicked off the scoring, with the run coming off the bat of Wade Jr. in the form of an RBI-double. That was quickly added to when Yordan came to the plate with the bases loaded and two-outs later that inning, smoking a two-RBI single past the glove of the shortstop.

A Cam Smith triple a couple innings later led to another run for Houston, going up 4-0, before the inning started off with two bangs. 

WIth the Apple TV+ sideline reporter, Tricia Whitaker, standing in the Crawford Boxes and talking about Issac Paredes, right on cue he slapped his 15th home run onto the train tracks. 

And as Whitaker credits herself for speaking it into existence, Christian Walker deposits another homer into left field, with both of them coming off the splitter putting Houston up 6-0.

It wasn’t till then that the Rangers started to slowly chip away at the lead, but it didn’t matter. A Joc Pederson homer and Evan Carter single provided the Rangers with their only two runs of the night while the Astros kept adding more and more.

A two-out Diaz homer in the eighth got the Astros going again.

Continuing with the two-out magic, a two-run two-out double from Peña and another two-out single from Paredes two batters later pushed the score to 10-2.

One more run came across to score once the Rangers put in a position player to pitch, eventually ending with an 11-2 Astros win.

Hunter Brown’s night ended on a bit of a weird play, with Paredes losing a chopper in the light, leading to a run, but he still shined on the mound, shutting the Rangers down.

Hunter Brown Final Line

5.2 IP, 6 H, 2 R, 2 BB, 5 K, 104-70 TP-S

Following Brown’s exit, the bullpen kept the Rangers at bay the rest of the game. After Brown left with a man on second, the first pitcher out of the pen, Enyel De Los Santos, gave up the RBI-single to Carter for the Rangers second run.

Following that, the Astros pen kept up their incredible stats post-All-Star, this time going 3.1 innings and only allowing two hits.

One thing to note is the continued tear that Peña is on since the All-Star break.

Since their first came after the break on July 17th, Peña has a 12-game hit streak with now four of those games being three-hit games. He, paired with Alvarez after, has turned the Astros into one of the hottest teams in the league currently.

With the win, for the first time since April, the Astros not only have sole possession of first place in the AL West, leading the Rangers now by 0.5 games, but are back above .500. Coming from down 6.0 games in the division and 11 games under .500, this is a huge turnaround.

Having the series win against the Rangers will mean a lot later down the line. With the league getting rid of the “game 163” format, each division series will mean more as the season winds down.

Houston will try and take the series tomorrow in the second of three games starting at 6:10 CT.

Feature photo from Astros on X, Source Link