Houston Astros: Game four is bombs away for the ‘Stros

The Houston Astros ride a pair of three-run homers to an 8-3 victory over the New York Yankees in Game 4 of the ALCS.

The Houston Astros took a three-games-to-one lead over New York in the American League Championship Series Thursday, and they did it using an old Earl Weaver weapon: the three-run homer.

The final score was 8-3, and the Astros benefitted from a pair of three-run blasts. George Springer hit one to give Houston a 3-1 lead in the third inning, and three innings later Carlos Correa made it 6-1 with a three-run bomb of his own.

The Houston Astros can wrap up the series Friday night when Justin Verlander takes the mound at Yankee Stadium against James Paxton.

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Here are the key turning points from Thursday’s game.

First inning: Houston Astros starter Zack Greinke came out shaky, and gave the Yankees a major chance to seize the momentum early. It is a measure of the problems New York is having actually scoring runs that they made the least of the opportunity.

Greinke tried to help. He walked the leadoff hitter, D.J. LeMahieu, gave up a base hit to Aaron Hicks and later walked Edwin Encarnacion and Brett Gardner, who came into the game a combined 2-for-25 in the ALCS. The walk to Gardner forced in a run and left the bases loaded for Gary Sanchez.

Perhaps Greinke’s big break was a nuancial one; his first-pitch curve broke just low, but plate umpire Dan Bellino called it a strike. That put Sanchez on the defensive, and after swinging through a hittable four-seam fastball he fanned on a low slider.

In an inning when lesser pitchers might have allowed four or five runs, Greinke got away with just one.

Third inning: Sometimes multiple-run innings happen for reasons having little to do with how well the pitcher is throwing. Yankee starter Masahiro Tanaka sailed through the first two innings but opened the third by walking Robinson Chirinos on four bad balls. Josh Reddick followed by taking a good pitch into right field for a base hit, then Tanaka left a splitter at thigh level for George Springer, who hammered it into the left-field seats.

As bad as that sudden 3-1 deficit was, it easily could have been worse. Jose Altuve and Michael Brantley followed the home run with base hits, but Tanaka worked through the heart of the order – Alex Bregman, Yuli Gurriel and Yordan Alvarez – to limit the damage.

After that brief but painful lapse, Tanaka recovered to retire the final nine Astros he faced.

Fifth inning: The Yankees got Greinke out of the game, but failed to capitalize. With one out, LeMahieu walked and then Greinke walked Aaron Judge. A.J. Hinch summoned Ryan Pressly to replace Greinke, and Pressly walked Aaron Hicks but then struck out Gleyber Torres and Edwin Encarnacion to quell the threat.

The whiffs made Yankee hitters one-for-eight with runners on base to that point in the game.

Sixth inning: Yankee manager Aaron Boone lifted Tanaka after five innings and replaced him with Chad Green. Green has been New York’s most reliable hitter in this series, but that was not the case Thursday night. And it didn’t help that D.J. LeMahieu muffed Bregman’s spinning grounder to open the inning.

One out later, Yordan Alvarez singled, setting the stage for Carlos Correa. Sanchez called for a tight fastball, but Green missed over the plate and Correa hit it 408 feet into the left-field seats. That made Houston’s lead 6-3.

Beyond Correa’s home run: After Pressly fanned two Yanks in a key situation in the fifth, Hinch replaced him with Josh James. This violated the dictum about not removing a pitcher who’s doing the job, and Hinch paid for his actions.

James, who did not have his usual command, walked Gardner and threw Sanchez a pitch he could hit into the left-field seats. That brought New York within three runs at 6-3.

But the Yankee defense set up Houston Astros insurance runs in the eighth and ninth that made the final score 8-3.

Yankee hitters complicated their inability to hit with runners in scoring position by failing to make consistent contact. New York batters struck out five times against Greinke, then eight more times against the Houston pen, for 13 strikeouts on the night. For comparison purposes, Astros batters only struck out six times.

The umpiring: Plate umpire Dan Bellino had to make 197 balls or strike calls through the long night, and he got 92.4 percent of hem correct. That’s about average.

But on two occasions Bellino violated the umpire’s prime directive, which is to avoid making his mistakes an influence on the game. As it turned out, neither did affect the outcome…but either could have.

In the Yankee fifth, Greinke retired the leadoff batter, gave up a hit to LeMahieu, then fell behind Judge two balls and no strikes. Greinke’s third pitch was a strike toward the top of the zone, but Bellino called it high for ball three. The fourth pitch was a called strike, and Judge swung through the fifth for a strike two that should have been strike three. Instead, he eventually walked, and Greinke exited.

It’s an easy case to make that if Bellino hadn’t missed that 2-0 call, Greinke wouldn’t have been removed from the game at that moment.

Bellino’s second error of significance occurred a few batters later as Pressly stared in at Encarnacion with the bases full and two out. The first two pitches were strikes, then Pressly delivered a fastball that caught the inside part of the plate. But Chirinos, who had set up on the outside corner, had to reach well back to catch the pitch, and Bellino reacted to the catcher’s movement by calling the pitch a ball.

That gave Encarnacion another shot at hitting in a key situation with the bases full, and after fouling the next pitch off Encarnacion fanned anyway.