Randy Arozarena went with the bases charged and two outs at the bottom of the ninth round to bring home the decisive driving when Seattle Mariners gathered to defeat the visiting Houston Astros 7-6 on Wednesday afternoon.
Seattle hit 5-0 before the Aroz arena met a Grand Slam in the eighth round and Julio Rodriguez added a two-run double in the ninth through the score of 6.
Mariners Reliever Casey Lawrence (1-0) got the victory, and Houston’s Bryan Abreu (0-1) took the loss.
After 6-4 into the bottom of the ninth, Astros took Abreu after closer to Josh Hader had worked for two of the previous three days.
Donovan Solano led with a single to the right and, a later, Miles Mastrobuoni hit the middle and sent Solano to the third. JP Crawford met a chopper for the third bass man Isaac Paredes, who tried to tag Solano as he retreated to the bag. Solano was originally called, but the sailors challenged the call and it was turned on video registration and left the bases loaded with one out.
Rodriguez lined a double down right field line to bind the score and Mitch Garver went. Astros threw Crawford out at home on Cal Raleigh’s Grounder to the first bass man Christian Walker for the second out, but Abreus 3-2 shooting controls were high and out of the strike zone to bring home the winning driving.
Astros took the lead with three runs in the second outside the Seattle starter Luis F. Castillo.
Houston added a run in the third on a base -loaded walk by Brendan Rodgers.
The point remained 4-0 until the eighth. Cam Smith lined a one-out single to the right and advanced to others on Jose Altuve’s single to the center. Paredes founded an Infield single from Lawrence to charge the bases, and Yordan Alvarez took home the race with a sacrificial fly on the left.
At the bottom of the inning, Mastrobuoni lined a lead single to the right outside Luis Contreras, and Crawford and Rodriguez went. Steven Okert came in and got Garver to fly out to a shallow left and knocked out Raleigh before Arozarena lifted a airball just over the left field wall to make it 5-4.
Astros added an insurance run in ninth when Jeremy Pena led with a double, stole third and one out later and got a wild pitch by Lawrence.
Houston Starter Hunter Brown allowed two hits over six speechless innings, did not go for a batter and knocked out three.
Castillo allowed four runs (three earned) and six hits over four rounds. He went five and knocked out three.
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