Spencer Arrighetti’s (L, 7-3) May dominance has been followed by significant June struggles, and tonight was no exception.
Arrighetti’s first pitch of the game was drilled out to right center for a solo homer by Travis Bazzana to give the Guardians a 1-0 lead.
Houston tied the game in the bottom of the second. Back-to-back singles by Isaac Paredes and Jose Altuve to open the frame gave the Astros runners on 1st & 2nd with no outs. Yainer Diaz followed with an RBI single scoring Paredes, with Altuve advancing
to third. Houston could do no more damage that inning, however, as Cam Smith flew to shallow left and both Jake Meyers and Brice Matthews struck out to end the inning.
Missing out on that kind of opportunity to have a big inning would immediately come back to haunt the Astros.
In the top of the 3rd, Kyle Manzardo hit a 2-run homer of a 91.6 MPH four-seam fastball from Arrighetti to give the Guardians a 3-1 lead.
In the top of the 5th, Bazzana would get Arrighetti again. This time, Bazzana hit a 3-run homer to right center to give Cleveland a 6-1 lead.
Arrighetti would pitch a 1-2-3 6th inning, and his final line would be 6 IP, 6 ER, 6H, 0BB, 8K, 3HR.
In the 7th, the Guardians would add 2 more runs on 4 straight singles off Astros reliever Nate Pearson.
Meanwhile, Guardians starter Joey Cantillo (W, 6-3), would retire 20 of the next 22 Astros batters following Diaz’ RBI single in the 2nd. He tossed 8 innings of 1 run ball while allowing 4 hits, one walk and striking out 9.
With the loss, the Astros fall to 36-42, and the Guardians improve to 41-36
Astros SP Kai-Wei Teng (3-6, 4.32 ERA) will oppose the Guardians’ Slade Cecconi (3-5, 4.60 ERA) in the rubber match tomorrow afternoon at 1:10PM CT.
