Houston gets shutout again
Gerrit Cole dominates the Astros with a complete-game shutout in return to Houston
Jul 10, 2021, 9:22 pm
Gerrit Cole dominated his former team on Saturday night to give the Yankees the win. Photo by Bob Levey/Getty Images
Gerrit Cole dominated his former team on Saturday night to give the Yankees the win.
With their temporarily struggling offense resulting in back-to-back losses including the opener of this series, the Astros tried to right the ship in the middle game on Saturday to keep the series win in play. Gerrit Cole would not allow it, though, as he would put on an incredible performance to keep Houston's bats cold, locking up the series for the Yankees.
Final Score: Yankees 1, Astros 0
Astros' Record: 54-35, first in the AL West
Winning Pitcher: Gerrit Cole (9-4)
Losing Pitcher: Zack Greinke (8-3)
Greinke exits early, Judge scores the only early run against him
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Whether it was planned or due to something unseen, Zack Greinke would go just four innings in this start against the Yankees. Over that span, he only had one mistake, a hanging pitch to Aaron Judge in the top of the third which he sent out of the ballpark for New York's first run, giving them a 1-0 lead which, with Gerrit Cole's performance, felt like enough. Greinke's final line: 4.0 IP, 3 H, 1 ER, 1 BB, 3 K, 1 HR, 65 P.
Cole dominates in his return to Houston with a complete-game shutout
The 1-0 lead felt much larger than that with Cole keeping the Astros' bats at bay over an impressive start. He didn't face a baserunner at all until a walk in the bottom of the fourth, and inning after inning continued to extend Houston's scoreless streak. After Greinke's night was done, Cristian Javier entered for Houston to try and eat up some innings, and he would do his job well. He erased a leadoff walk in the top of the fifth for a scoreless inning, as well as a single in the top of the sixth, He gave his team one more inning, a 1-2-3 top of the seventh, finishing three impressive innings to maintain the one-run deficit.
Ryne Stanek was next, and thanks to an inning-ending double play he was able to work around a leadoff single and one-out walk to strand the runners and keep it 1-0. With it still stuck at that score in the top of the ninth, Houston brought in closer Ryan Pressly to give their offense one more chance in the home half of the inning. Surprisingly, Cole returned to the mound for New York in the bottom of the ninth, entering with 112 pitches. After a leadoff single, he would get two outs, reaching 126 pitches, and turned Yankees manager Aaron Boone away when he tried to come and get the ball from him. He would make it the right decision, as with his 129th pitch he would strike out Yordan Alvarez to finish the complete-game shutout.
Up Next: The finale of this series and the "first half" of the season before the All-Star break will be a 1:10 PM Central Start on Sunday. The Astros will hand the ball to Framber Valdez (5-1, 2.86 ERA) while the Yankees will send Jameson Taillon (4-4, 5.05 ERA) to the mound.
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Marcell Ozuna hit his major league-leading eighth homer and Orlando Arcia’s RBI single in the 10th inning lifted the Atlanta Braves to a 5-4 win over the Houston Astros on Wednesday.
It completes a three-game sweep of the struggling Astros and is Atlanta’s fourth straight victory.
The Braves scored two runs in the eighth inning to tie it at 4-4. Michael Harris II started the 10th as the automatic runner on second and there was one out in the inning when Seth Martinez (1-1) intentionally walked Matt Olson.
Ozuna lined out to right field to send Harris to third base. Arcia then singled on a ground ball to left field to score Harris and put the Braves on top.
Pinch-runner Jake Meyers was on second when Kyle Tucker walked with no outs in the 10th. Meyers moved to third on a fly out by Yainer Diaz but Jeremy Peña grounded into a double play to end it.
A.J. Minter (3-1) got the last two outs of the ninth for the win and Raisel Iglesias earned his fifth save.
Reigning NL MVP Ronald Acuña Jr. added his first homer of the season to help the Braves to the victory. Ozuna also leads the majors with 23 RBIs and he extended his hitting streak to 16 games, which ties his career best and is the longest active streak in the majors.
Yordan Alvarez and Mauricio DubĂłn both homered for the Astros, who fell to 6-14 and are last in the AL West.
There was one out in the first when Alvarez connected on his homer to the seats in left field to put Houston up 1-0.
Ozuna opened the second with his 432-foot shot to left field, which bounced off the wall and tied the game.
Acuña put the Braves up 2-1 when he sent the first pitch of the fifth inning to straightaway center field.
The Astros tied it on an RBI single by Alex Bregman in the fifth and Kyle Tucker’s RBI double came next to put the Astros up 3-2.
Dubón hit his first home run of the year off Jesse Chavez to start Houston’s sixth and push the lead to 4-2.
Harris singled to start the seventh before a ground-rule double by Austin Riley. Olson reached, and Harris scored on a fielding error by first baseman José Abreu when he couldn’t grab a routine ground ball.
There was one out in the inning when Riley scored on a sacrifice fly by Arcia to tie it at 4-all.
Houston starter J.P. France allowed four hits and two runs in five innings.
Max Fried gave up seven hits and three runs in five innings.
UP NEXT
Braves: Atlanta is off Thursday before opening a series against Texas on Friday night with LHP Chris Sale (1-1, 4.58 ERA) on the mound.
Astros: Houston is also off Thursday before ace Justin Verlander will make his season debut Friday night against Washington. The three-time Cy Young Award winner opened the season on the injured list with inflammation in his right shoulder.