Hunter Brown cooled down one of baseball’s hottest offenses, Jose Altuve paced an 11-hit attack with a double and two singles and the Houston Astros salvaged one win in their three-game series against the host Oakland Athletics with an 8-1 victory on Wednesday afternoon.
Chas McCormick homered while Alex Bregman and Yainer Diaz joined Altuve with two RBIs apiece, helping the Astros hold the top spot in the American League West by completing a 3-3 Western swing.
Brown (9-6) improved to 3-0 in five career starts against the A’s, pitching around eight hits to allow just one run in six innings. He walked one and struck out eight.
The Athletics stranded 10 baserunners, seven during Brown’s six innings.
Oakland had outscored the visitors 12-2 in winning the first two meetings of the series, continuing a stretch in which the A’s put up 56 runs over six games.
Bryan Abreu, Tayler Scott and Bryan King each threw an inning of shutout relief for Houston.
After a sacrifice fly by Diaz and an RBI double by Oakland’s Miguel Andujar allowed the teams to trade runs in the first, the Astros took the lead for good in the second when Altuve singled home Jon Singleton.
McCormick made it 3-1 against A’s starter JP Sears (7-8) in the fifth with his fourth homer of the season, a solo shot, and Jeremy Pena singled home Diaz for a three-run lead in the sixth before the Astros broke the game open in the seventh.
Altuve had an RBI double and Bregman added a two-run double to end Sears’ day before Diaz lifted a sacrifice fly to center to cap the four-run uprising.
All eight runs (seven earned) were charged to Sears in his six-plus innings. He served up nine hits in a walk-free performance, striking out three.
Altuve, McCormick and Singleton each scored twice for the Astros, who had lost three in a row.
Seth Brown went 3-for-3 with a walk and Andujar had a single and a double for the A’s, who completed a 4-2 homestand.