Kluber makes lead hold up
Indians 5, Astros 4
HOUSTON — The Cleveland Indians scored early, Corey Kluber pitched late and the bullpen — well, the bullpen hung on Saturday at Minute Maid Park.
Michael Brantley homered to start a three-run first inning and Kluber struck out 10 in seven innings in a 5-4 win over the Houston Astros. The Indians have won just five of their last 13 games.
Houston’s Dallas Keuchel (3-6) wasn’t locked in early and Cleveland rocked him.
Brantley hit a oneout homer to left, followed by consecutive doubles by Jose Ramirez and Edwin Encarnacion to make it 2-0. Jason Kipnis then doubled to rightcenter to give Kluber a 3-0 lead.
Kluber (7-2) protected the lead as if it was made of the finest china. He held the Astros scoreless through five innings, striking out eight. The two-time Cy Young winner struck out the side — Jose Altuve, Carlos Correa and Yuli Gurriel — in the fourth.
Houston finally reached Kluber in the sixth on Correa’s The Indians’ Michael Brantley shakes hands with third-base coach Mike Sarbaugh after hitting a solo home run off Astros starter Dallas Keuchel in the first inning, helping stake Corey Kluber to a 3-0 lead.
two-out, two-run homer, but by that time Cleveland had five runs on the board.
“I executed most of my pitches pretty well early on,” Kluber said. “Later on, the pitch Correa hit out wasn’t a good pitch.”
The Indians squeezed out a run in the fifth as Rajai Davis walked and advanced to third on two groundouts. He scored on a Ramirez’s slow chopper down the third-base line for a 4-0 lead.
Yan Gomes made it 5-0 in the sixth with a long home run to left
off former teammate Joe Smith.
Things grew interesting — as they seem to do of late — when Kluber left. With Andrew Miller unavailable because of back spasms, Neil Ramirez started the eighth and allowed a one-out homer to Alex Bregman and a double to Altuve.
Closer Cody Allen relieved and retired Correa on a fly ball to the track in left field and Brian McCann on a fly ball to right. Allen then pitched the ninth for his first save since April 25 — and Cleveland’s
first in May — but not without a flaw.
Allen allowed a oneout homer to Marwin Gonzalez to make it a one-run game. He retired the next two batters for his sixth save.
“Anytime you can play with the lead it’s good,” Indians manager Terry Francona said. “We got a couple of add-on runs that we needed because when you play these guys, they just keep coming. Fortunately, they ran out of time.”
Information from The Associated Press was used in this story.