Preston Tucker slugs two homers and Collin McHugh solid through seven innings.
WP: C. McHugh (11 – 5)
LP: J. Kelly (2 – 6)
Save: L. Gregerson (20)
Submitted by Sphinx Drummond
It worked again. The recurring theme, hit homers-score runs, get nice starting starting pitching and lock down relief work. The Astros scored all of their runs off of the long ball on Wednesday, Preston Tucker started it off with a solo shot in the first inning to get things rolling and to give McHugh a lead. Evan Gattis chimed in with his own solo dinger in the fourth to build the lead to 3 to 0. In the fourth inning, with Jose Altuve on base, Tucker hit is second homerun and third RBI of the night, giving the Astros a 4 to 0 lead, which would prove to be enough for the victory.
Collin McHugh, didn’t have his best but what he had was pretty good and he was able to work out of a couple of tight jams, he did get hit around for 2 runs in the sixth, but was never in serious trouble thanks to the run support. McHugh worked seven innings allowing 7 hits, while walking 2 and striking out 4. In the eighth inning it was Pat Neshek time and he worked 2 strikeouts around 1 walk in his inning of work before giving way to Luke Gregerson who got all three of the batters he faced in the ninth out for his 20th save of the year.
Currently the Astros are 2 games behind the Burning Angels in the division and .007 percentage points behind the Evil Empire in the league standings for fourth place overall. Thursday the Astros try for a series sweep when Lance McCullers (4 -3, 2.52) takes the mound against Wade Miley (8 – 8, 4.49) in a 7:10pm CST start time.
Attendance – 31104
Game Time – 2:44