The Aggies play Auburn this week. Photo by Alex Bierens de Haan/Getty Images.
Aggies look to keep rolling against Arkansas after bounce-back performance versus Miami
Things are not going too well in College Station these days. The Aggies dropped their fifth straight game with a 41-24 loss to Florida at home. That ties the longest losing streak for the Aggies since 1980. Who saw this coming? Definitely not Jimbo Fisher, not the A&M fan base and hell not even most of the national media. Texas A&M was the preseason #6 team in the country. Yet here we are, A&M needing to win out to become bowl eligible in Fisher’s fifth season.
The issues with this team are too many to count at this point, and to make things worse this past Saturday a flu outbreak ravaged the team. When it rains, it pours. To make matters worse, five-star freshman quarterback Connor Weigman was one of the players affected and did not play. The week after Coach Fisher finds his stud QB, he can’t play and back to Haynes King we go. When it rains, it pours…you get the point.
It’s pretty predictable when a team already very thin due to injury, loses about 10-15 players due to an illness, that they are going to struggle. For the first half of the ballgame, it was pretty close as the limited Aggies got into a little track meet with the Gators, going into halftime with the lead. Coming out of the intermission, the Aggies' offense sputtered while the Gators continued to take advantage of the depleted Aggies' defense. The Ags’ ended up getting shut out in the second half in route to the Maroon and White’s fifth-straight loss. Talking about these losses gets tiring, and I can only imagine what it’s like for that squad inside the Bright Complex as they turn their attention to a road trip to Auburn.
Coming into the season, the Ags road trip to the plains was an easy chalk-up as a win. However, I think it is going to be very difficult for Jimbo Fisher and the Ags to take this one on the road. Auburn does a good job of running the ball and what does A&M struggle with defensively? Stopping the run… Jimbo is going to have his work cut out for him to keep a bowl game in play. I see the Aggies struggling yet again and losing the battle of 3-6 teams. Auburn wins 24-17 and A&M falls to 3-7.
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Oswald Peraza hit a two-run single in the ninth inning to help the Los Angeles Angels snap a three-game losing skid by beating the Houston Astros 4-1 on Saturday night.
Peraza entered the game as a defensive replacement in the seventh inning and hit a bases-loaded fly ball to deep right field that eluded the outstretched glove of Cam Smith. It was the fourth straight hit off Astros closer Bryan Abreu (3-4), who had not allowed a run in his previous 12 appearances.
The Angels third run of the ninth inning scored when Mike Trout walked with the bases loaded.
Kyle Hendricks allowed one run while scattering seven hits over six innings. He held the Astros to 1 for 8 with runners in scoring position, the one hit coming on Jesús Sánchez’s third-inning infield single that scored Jeremy Peña.
Reid Detmers worked around a leadoff walk to keep the Astros scoreless in the seventh, and José Fermin (3-2) retired the side in order in the eighth before Kenley Jansen worked a scoreless ninth to earn his 24th save.
Houston’s Spencer Arrighetti struck out a season-high eight batters over 6 1/3 innings. The only hit he allowed was Zach Neto’s third-inning solo home run.
Yordan Alvarez had two hits for the Astros, who remained three games ahead of Seattle for first place in the AL West.
Key moment
Peraza’s two-run single to deep right field that broke a 1-1 tie in the ninth.
Key Stat
Opponents were 5 for 44 against Abreu in August before he allowed four straight hits in the ninth.
Up next
Astros RHP Hunter Brown (10-6, 2.37 ERA) faces RHP José Soriano (9-9, 3.85) when the series continues Sunday.