Indians 5, Astros 4
W: Allen (1-0)
L: Ambriz (0-1)
It’s a lot like going to McDonalds. It’s never going to be that first choice for a meal, it’s either some distant sense memory, some flavor you think you remember or else it’s the last option left to you.
The terrible reality sets in once you take a bite. The fries taste like salty cardboard and if you’re lucky, the Quarter Pounder is mostly a squishy ketchup-mustard flavored mass. Perhaps it’s warm, but those are the high points in the deal. When you’re down to telling yourself that maybe half those fries tasted something like fries, and that hamburger was actually above room temperature for a change, you’re in Houston Astro territory.
That oily film coating your mouth is 5-12 in focus. It’s looking down the line of batting averages and seeing .215, .226, .226, .236, .229, .230 among the regulars.
Porter’s doing a pretty good job. He’s flailing at the controls but not losing his mind in a Cooperish frenzy. He’s upbeat, positive and intelligent, mixing and matching what he’s got as well as he can, but when your best culinary tool is a heat lamp, you’re probably not going to impress Padma at the Quickfire.
FeMart came back from the DL with a lot to prove, and he yanked the first pitch he saw for a 2-0 lead. Bedard gave one back to Yan Gomes, and then another run in the third. Despite eight strikeouts through four innings, Bedard was replaced by Long Lefty du Jour Obie Oberholtzer, who surrendered two runs in two innings, mostly by being too fat over the plate in tight situations.
Houston tied it up in the sixth. Ambriz came on for the seventh and got two quick outs via a hard-breaking yellowhammer, but fleeting success with a high slider led him to try that pitch one too many times. Reynolds slashed a letter-high slider over the line for the gamewinner.
The Astros had two more chances to win this one. In the bottom of the seventh with two on, Gonzalez inexplicably bunted foul for strike three and Carter took a fat fastball over the middle of the plate to end the frame. In the ninth, Houston had the bases loaded with one out but Carter was again overmatched, swinging over a low slider to fan before Castro’s hard grounder was fielded to end the game.
At McDonald’s, the only surprises are the good ones, when your food is not quite as awful as you know it’s going to be. In Houston, so far this season, there are no surprises.