Every game matters in the push for the playoffs, and for the Houston Astros, their lead in the AL West is far from safe. On Friday, their bid for a more secure place in the playoff race took a hit, as they suffered a 4-3 loss to the Texas Rangers in 12 innings — with recently called-up outfielder Dustin Harris playing spoiler for Carlos Correa and company.
It was a war of who would blink first between the Astros and Rangers, and in the end, it was the former that did, with Lance McCullers Jr. allowing a walk-off double to end proceedings in the 12th. All night long, there was a struggle for both teams to drive in baserunners, with the two sides combining to go 3-28 with runners in scoring position on the night — with one of the Astros' two hits in such situations coming in the eighth when Correa drove in Jose Altuve with a monster home run after the second baseman turned left fielder hit a double.
Suffice to say, it was not a very productive day in the office for the Astros' position players. But for Correa, this is all part of the ebbs and flows that a team goes through in the regular season. No matter how hard one tries, as per the third baseman, there are simply at-bats that even the most elite hitter in the league can't do much of anything.
“There's a lot of guys here that have won championships. I don't think a regular season game will make them press. It's just sometimes you don't feel good at the plate. The at-bats find you and there's nothing you can do about it. It's really hard to explain,” Correa said, per Chandler Rome of The Athletic.
Astros hit a wall in loss to Rangers
Not every good team can be good every single day. The MLB regular season is 162 games long, and there are bound to be off-nights even for the best of the best.
On Friday, however, the Astros were off from the plate at the wrong time. Yordan Alvarez, who's been playing much better as of late, went 0-4 on the night, but he didn't exactly get any opportunities to drive in any runs. Houston couldn't get anything right on the sequencing department, and it happens.
At the very least, the Astros' lead in the division still stands at a relatively comfortable 3.5 games. They will have two more games in the series against the Rangers to try and bump up that cushion of theirs.
