Astros turn 5-4-3 triple play in win against Tigers
The Houston Astros entered play on Saturday with the third highest winning percentage in MLB. Third!
Needless to say, they’ve been the biggest and/or most pleasant surprise in the entire league, and they’ve done it by doing everything well. That includes hitting a league-leading 62 home runs, a pitching staff that ranks top 10 in ERA (3.50) and of course, playing excellent defense.
In Saturday’s 3-2 win against the Detroit Tigers, it was the latter two that shined the most. Rookie Lance McCullers allowed just two runs on six hits over six sharp innings in his second career start, but it wouldn’t have been possible without one nifty defensive play in the fifth inning that resulted in three quick outs.
That’s right, the Astros turned a triple play. The franchise’s first since 2004.
Detroit actually plated a temporary go-ahead run in the inning after James McCann led off with a double and then came around to score after Jose Iglesias’ infield single and a throwing error that allowed Anthony Gose to reach. Obviously they were poised to do much more damage and potentially blow the game open when Ian Kinsler stepped in.
Kinsler, who’s still without a home run this season but has managed a solid .295/.367/.382 battling line, worked himself into a 2-1 count but couldn’t take advantage. He hit a soft chopper to third baseman Jonathan Villar, who stepped on third to start the smooth 5-4-3, around the horn triple play.
[Woah, The Stew has a podcast now?! Yep, you should listen.]
There’s really nothing fancy to play up. It was about as routine as a triple play can be, but credit the Astros nonetheless for getting the optimum result at the absolute best time.
It was definitely a turning point in the game. After holding the deficit at one run, Houston’s offense immediately responded with two runs in the next half inning to take a 3-2 lead. Jason Castro and Marwin Gonzalez each delivered RBI singles in the inning, and then McCullers and three Astros took it from there. In fact, the Tigers never had another baserunner following the triple play.
With the win, the Astros improved to 28-16 overall, good enough for a 5 1/2 game lead over the Angels in the AL West. Houston is also an MLB-best 11-4 record in one-run games this season after going 17-28 in such contests last season. That mark was second worst in MLB.
Indeed, everything has turned around in Houston, and with each victory the team’s staying power looks even stronger.
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Mark Townsend is a writer for Big League Stew on Yahoo Sports. Have a tip? Email him at [email protected] or follow him on Twitter! Follow @Townie813
