A 4-Game Mega-Series in 2 Cities (Part 2: Houston)

GAME 67: Astros 5, Diamondbacks 1
GAME 68: Astros 5, Diamondbacks 4 (10 innings)

What can I say? When you're hot, you're hot. When you're winning, you aren't losing, no matter how hard you try. 

And the Astros tried their damnedest last night. They loaded the bases in the first inning with no outs, and only scored one run. They loaded the bases in the seventh with no outs and didn't score at all. They loaded the bases in the ninth inning with one out -- and didn't score. MattyD hit into rally-killing double plays in the 7th and 9th innings, was out on runner interference, and struck out 3 times - truly the head goat of this apparent fiasco. Altuve made a fielding error (only his second of the year!) that led to a Dback run, and was later hit on the hand by a pitch and left the game injured.  Corporan committed a catcher interference error.  With a precarious one-run lead in the ninth, Qualls gave up a first-pitch home run to blow the save.

And despite all this, they won. I'm not sure that the young dugout dancers ever really considered losing. So by the bottom of the tenth inning, when Carter hit his walk-off homer, the happy dancing moved to the field to celebrate another win.

There were obviously some good things that happened in this game too; the Astros managed to score 5 runs despite going 0-for-6 with RISP. Fowler and Altuve both had multi-hit games, continuing a pattern of leadoff base runners that's been critical to recent success. Corporan joined them in the multi-hit club, hitting 3 for 4 with a 2-run homer and a pair of singles. Singleton hit his third home run, as well as an RBI sac fly. Springer only had one hit, but made two  highlight reel-worthy diving catches in right field. The one in the eighth inning was so obviously going to be a hit that Goldschmidt took off from second base. That left Springer plenty of time to get up and toss the ball to Villar at second to complete an inning-ending double play. Is this guy Superman?

And then there was Chris Carter's leadoff game-winning homer in the bottom of the tenth.

While not lights-out, Feldman had a better game than his last two. He pitched into the seventh inning, giving up 3 runs (2 ER) on 4 hits, walked none, and struck out 6. That's significantly better than his last outing, when he didn't finish the second inning, and the previous one when he gave up 9 ERs! The bullpen did a good job: Downs and Fields combined for 1 2/3 scoreless innings.  Qualls (after 17 2/3 scoreless innings and 7 consecutive save conversions) gave up a first-pitch homer to tie it up, before shutting down the Dbacks for the rest of the ninth. Sipp pitched a 1-2-3-4 tenth inning. Yep, he made 4 outs, a K and 3 ground ball outs. But the third out didn't count because of catcher interference. And this was against the top of the Dback lineup. Are we sure that Sipp is a lefty-specialist, not a closer?

All in all, some groaning, cheering, nail-biting, and ultimately happy dancing fun, as the Astros break .450 on their way up up up.

With all that drama Thursday night, Wednesday's 5-1 win seems practically ho-hum. Just another Dallas Keuchel All Star-quality start, his sixth in the past seven starts. Bo Porter remarked afterwards, "If he's not an All-Star, who is?" I'm not so sure about his chances. Houston's young players are still not really on the radar of All Star voters or even most other team players and managers. If we only end up with a single player in the ASG, like previous years, it will most likely to be Altuve, who's leading the AL in runs and stolen bases. But Keuchel doesn't seem too worried about that. He kind of reminds me of Oswalt - just goes out there and does his thing, and does it really well. This time it was 8 innings, giving up one run on 4 hits and 1 walk, striking out 5. Just 101 pitches, and with a 4 run lead, he could have probably stayed in for another CG. But Porter brought in Qualls to throw a 1-2-3 ninth in the non-save situation.

The offensive star of the game was obviously Carter, who hit a pair of solo homers. The kid's batting average is still under .200 (well, it's .199), but he's been showing some serious muscle with 3 homers in the past 2 games, now leading the team with 13 long balls. That's including the grand slam he hit last weekend! It's amazing to see an Astros team that actually has real power hitting. Don't you love these strong, energetic, and happy-to-be-here kids!?!

The Astros will be playing 3 this weekend against the Rays, the new Worst Team in Baseball, since the Astros decided they didn't want to compete for those honors anymore. I don't want to say anything else and jinx it.

DUST EATERS COUNT: 7! The Astros record is now 31-37 (.456). There are now SEVEN teams worse than the Astros, including the 2013 Champion Red Sox (.455)! The others are the Rays (.373), Phillies (.438), Freakin' Mets (.439), Cubs (.406), Padres (.424), and Diamondbacks (.420).