SEATTLE SWEEPS ASTROS, TIGHTENING AL WEST RACE
Seattle scores in 9th, 10th to complete four-game sweep, tighten race
On another hapless day in front of an alarmed home crowd — the day the worst series of their season concluded — the Astros took solace in a single fact.
Edwin Diaz had finished each of their previous three losses to Seattle. Utilizing him a fourth time in as many days was unplanned by the Mariners.
But in the bottom of the 10th inning, after two Astros closers combusted a game, the Mariners’ bullpen door opened. Out trotted Diaz. He pleaded with Scott Servais for the baseball should a save situation arise. The manager obliged.
The game’s best closer, who totaled 36 pitches in the series’ first three games, needed just 10 to execute his job Sunday. Alex Bregman struck a two-out single against him for the only drama, but Diaz’s 46th save secured a 4-3 Seattle win, sending the withering World Series champions further into a spiral.
It was the first four-game sweep by an Astros opponent this season. The Mariners had never swept the Astros in four games.
Eight straight games inside Minute Maid Park have ended in an Astros defeat. Dating to July 11, they’ve lost nine consecutive home games to divisional foes. Their American League West lead is down to 2½ games over Oakland, with Seattle four back.
“It was a bad weekend,” manager A.J. Hinch said flatly, minutes after his bullpen blew up.
Hector Rondon is Hinch’s stated closer. Roberto Osuna, the debated deadline acquisition, could soon usurp the title. They were entrusted with the ninth and 10th innings, respectively.
Both allowed run-scoring hits. Ryon Healy’s prodigious solo home run against Rondon coughed up a lead the Astros’ beleaguered offense manufactured in the eighth. The RBI double Osuna yielded to Mitch Haniger lost the game.
To begin this series, Servais inserted Haniger into the leadoff spot in a scuffling batting order. Haniger had never led off in his major league career. He struck five doubles and a homer and drove in five runs against the Astros. Sunday’s decisive hit arrived on a four-seam fastball.
“I missed that pitch down and in,” Osuna said. “It was supposed to go up on the hands for a ball. He’s a good hitter, he had a good series, and that’s it. We’re going to make the adjustments, and we’re going to get better, too.”
Sealy finds Crawford Boxes
Entering in the ninth inning of a game his team led 3-2, Rondon threw eight pitches to record two outs.
Healy was Seattle’s final hope. He watched two pitches that evened the count against him. Rondon reached for a 1-1 slider. It hung in the zone. Healy hammered it into the Crawford Boxes, handing Rondon his second blown save in the last 15 chances.
“I missed the location with that pich, and it’s part of the game,” Rondon said. “I feel a little bit bad because I let down my teammates, but it’s the way baseball is. We’ll come in next game and try to win.”
They will do so deploying a lineup without Jose Altuve and George Springer. The Astros have mustered eight runs in their last 28 innings. Sunday, for five innings, a man without a major league appearance since April stymied them.
One-hundred and seven days separated Erasmo Ramirez from his last Mariners start. An aching right shoulder forced him to the disabled list twice this year.
His rehabilitation coincided with Felix Hernandez’s decline. Thursday, Hernandez was jettisoned to the bullpen. Ramirez replaced him in the rotation, becoming the latest man to silence Minute Maid Park.
Ramirez tossed 79 pitches across five scoreless innings. Twelve of the first 13 Astros to face him did not reach. Marwin Gonzalez smacked a one-out single in the second inning to interrupt the malaise. Josh Reddick and Tyler White flew out to resume it.
In the fifth, the Astros loaded the bases. Gonzalez struck a single. So did Reddick, after a 10pitch plate appearance. Gonzalez scurried to scoring position, space this current lineup rarely occupies. White arrived.
Third baseman Kyle Seager booted his sharp grounder, momentarily sparing the Astros a major league-leading 110th double play of the season.
The gaffe afforded hope. Kyle Tucker watched strike three to subdue it.
Martin Maldonado rolled into a cleanly turned twin killing to extinguish the promise.
Correa optimistic
“We know we have a great team, and we know we’re going to come through and get out of this scuffle to play great baseball once again,” shortstop Carlos Correa said. “We have great hitters that can do a lot of damage, but it’s about clicking and putting at-bats together to score a lot of runs again.”
Correa’s first hit in 38 games arrived on an accidental swing, a halfhearted effort on the first pitch Nick Vincent tossed. The cutter sailed inside.
Correa could not hold his momentum and check his swing. His bat met the baseball. It trickled up the first-base line. Healy lowered his glove and could not catch it.
This excuse-me effort was Correa’s first hit since returning from a 36-game absence. It tied the game at 2.
One batter later, Evan Gattis bludgeoned a sacrifice fly to center field, affording the reeling Astros a foreign feeling. They led late in a home game.
“It never feels like enough right now,” Hinch said. “We’ve lost four in a row. We never feel like it’s ever enough.”