*Photo from the Laredo Morning Times*
Houston leads series 2-0
This team can beat you so many different ways in the batter's box. Yordan Alvarez homered, Jose Abreu homered twice, and the Houston Astros defeated the Minnesota Twins with a 9-1 victory on Tuesday in Minneapolis.
After losing game two at home, the Astros came out in full force in game 3 and put a damper on the Twins party, rocking them for 9 runs to put the Astros one win away from the ALCS. Abreu was the star of the show, homering twice and driving in 5 runs.
Someone else who kept up their hot streak in October was Alvarez. He hit his 4th home run in 3 games on Tuesday in addition to two doubles. He sits behind only Juan Gonzalez and Ken Griffey Jr for most home runs in a best of 5 playoff series, with both having 5 long balls.
Astros manager Dusty Baker said of Alvarez "He thrives on the big moment, and they did pitch him well. But if you can hit, you can hit. There aren't a whole bunch of hitters around, but he's one of the top hitters in baseball, and he has a tremendous amount of concentration. He has a very short stroke to be such a big man. I mean, most big men have longer swings. He's very quiet and confident."
Kyle Tucker gave the Astros a 1-0 lead in the first inning with an RBI single that scored Jose Altuve. Then came Abreu, who very quickly made it a 4-0 game with a 3 run home run to left field. It stayed that way until Alex Bregman hit RBI singles in both the 5th and 6th innings, making it a 6-0 Astros lead.
Willi Castro got the Twins on the board in the bottom of the 6th inning, hitting an RBI single to right field that scored Carlos Correa. It would stay 6-1 until the 9th inning, when Alvarez got that run back with a solo home run to right field. Abreu then added his second home run of the day, this one a two run shot to left field to make it a 9-1 final score.
Baker said of his team after the game "That's the kind of club we have. It's a very confident club, not a cocky club. We don't showboat too much. We just play. The guys have a knack of picking each other up. From day to day, it could be a number of heroes, like today, or somebody carries us on that particular day."
Cristian Javier had a strong start for the Astros, pitching 5 shutout innings while racking up 9 strikeouts. Hunter Brown worked the 6th and allowed one run. Bryan Abreu, Phil Maton, and Rafael Montero each threw a scoreless inning to seal the win.
Sonny Gray had a short start for the Twins, allowing 5 runs, 4 earned, in 4+ innings pitched. Emilio Pagan pitched a scoreless inning before Kenta Maeda allowed a run in two innings. Bailey Ober allowed 3 runs in 1 1/3 innings before Griffin Jax pitched 2/3 of an inning.
Correa said of the Twins season being on the line that "When you go into an elimination game, you’ve got to be ready to do whatever is possible to help the team win. Everybody's available. All the arms are available. And we’ve got to do a better job with people on base if we want to stay alive. We're going to do that tomorrow."
Game 4 of the series is on Wednesday night in Minneapolis. The Astros try to close out the series and advance to the ALCS with Jose Urquidy getting the start. The Twins need to win to force a deciding game 5 as Joe Ryan will start with the season on the line.
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