TABLES TURNED
This time, it’s the Diamondbacks who win in 10.
Players the Astros have discarded often come back to haunt them. Prior to Saturday’s game, manager Dusty Baker lamented the exploits of Josh Rojas and Abraham Toro against the Astros this season. Humberto Castellanos’ start for Arizona on Saturday night was the next scheduled stop on the revenge tour.
Castellanos did not need to inflict much damage. The Astros did it to themselves.
A series of defensive lapses and stranded runners loomed large. The Astros produced seven more hits than the previous night but found themselves in an extra-inning situation nonetheless. This time, the result was a 6-4 loss to the Diamondbacks in 10 innings at Minute Maid Park.
After starter Lance McCullers Jr. finished, Houston’s bullpen covered three scoreless innings of a tie game. Yordan Alvarez became one of 23 major leaguers to exceed the 30 home run mark this season with his 31st long ball. Neither could negate a 2-for-8 mark with runners in scoring position.
Yimi Garcia surrendered the winning runs in the 10th inning on an RBI single and a two-run home run. Jason Castro’s RBI was not enough to rescue a win.
Facing an Arizona lineup containing eight lefthanded hitters, McCullers Jr. went six innings and threw 111 pitches, matching his season-high. He yielded seven hits, three runs (two earned) and two walks with eight strikeouts, his lone hiccup a poor fourth inning.
Castellanos, who debuted for the Astros as a reliever last year and was designated for assignment this offseason, pitched five innings and gave up three earned runs in his first outing against his former team.
Castellanos began by striking out Jose Altuve and walking Alex Bregman. On an 0-1 pitch, Alvarez crushed a monster tworun homer to the centerfield porch. The ball traveled an eye-popping 453 feet with an exit velocity of 114 mph, the second-longest home run by an Astros player this season.
McCullers cruised through three scoreless innings on 39 pitches while allowing one double and one walk. Hard-hit extrabase hits and sloppy defense by the Astros allowed the Diamondbacks to score two earned runs and one unearned in the fourth inning.
McCullers gave up a leadoff double to David Peralta before he got his first out of the inning via a gift from home plate umpire Mike Estabrook. McCullers fell behind 3-0 in the count and recovered to strike out Calhoun on eight pitches, albeit with a low changeup that should have been called a ball. Daulton Varsho got revenge for the Diamondbacks when he slipped a ground ball past Yuli Gurriel to drive home Peralta, a play that was scored an error on the Astros first baseman.
Walker, Arizona’s lone right-handed hitter, lined a double into right field and Varsho scored when Kyle Tucker flubbed his first pickup attempt. A passed ball by catcher Martín Maldonado moved Walker to third base, and Pavin Smith’s RBI single gave the Diamondbacks a 3-2 lead.
After another single and a line drive out, another passed ball by Maldonado allowed the runners to advance to second and third base. McCullers sent Rojas down swinging to stop the landslide.
“One thing I wish I would’ve done a little better was stop the bleeding there in the fourth,” McCullers said. “But overall, gave our team a chance to win which is always the goal. I felt like I was pretty good.”
The Astros wasted equalizing opportunities in each of the next two innings. In the fourth, after Gurriel singled off the glove of third baseman Josh VanMeter, Tucker blooped a base hit to put two on with one out. Carlos Correa’s sacrifice fly moved Gurriel to third base but Marwin Gonzalez hit a ground ball directly at the first baseman.
With two outs in the bottom of the fifth inning, Altuve doubled off the leftfield wall for his 850th career hit at Minute Maid Park, passing Lance Berkman to move into sole possession of the stadium record. He advanced to third base on Bregman’s base hit. With runners on the corners, Alvarez grounded out.
Houston saved a run in the top of the sixth inning with a clutch 8-6-2 putout. McCullers had already procured two outs when VanMeter lined a hit off the left field wall. Alvarez missed the rebound but center fielder Chas McCormick made the relay throw to cutoff man Correa, who fired to Maldonado to cut down a run at the plate.
Castellanos was pulled off the mound in the bottom of the sixth after he gave up a single and a double to Gurriel and Tucker. After reliever Brandyn Sittinger entered, Correa’s sacrifice fly to right scored Gurriel as Tucker slid safely into third base.
Tucker, however, was caught stealing home a moment later for the frame’s second out — a sacrifice Baker said the Astros made on purpose to compensate for the fact that Gurriel improperly departed third base early on the previous play and prevent Arizona from challenging. Gonzalez struck out swinging to leave the score tied 3-3.
“That was a heads-up play by (third base coach) Omar Lopez,” Baker said. “He knew the rules and they were gonna challenge the fact that Yuli left early and he said that he did leave early, and that would have negated that run.”
Phil Maton and Brooks Raley combined for a scoreless seventh inning and Ryne Stanek tossed an eighth inning for Houston. Ryan Pressly procured two outs in the ninth before Rojas struck a two-out double to center. Ketel Marte battled Pressly to a full count, but the closer coaxed a groundout to end the frame.
Garcia entered for the 10th inning. After procuring one out allowed three runs to score. Calhoun drove in a run with an RBI single through the infield before Varsho walloped a 3-2 pitch to center field to balloon the lead to 6-3. Fans streamed toward the exits.
Tyler Clippard took the mound to face the Astros in extras for the second consecutive night. Castro, pinch-hitting for Maldonado, got one run back with an RBI hit. Altuve reached on a ground ball but Castro was forced out at second base. Bregman drew a walk to nudge Altuve into scoring position. Both advanced a base on Alvarez’s groundout. Gurriel squared up at the plate, perhaps hoping for redemption from his baserunning mistake and for Clippard to gift Houston another walkoff win. He had no such luck.