The Giants entered Wednesday’s game with the Houston Astros hoping to move on to Chicago with a split and a .500 record. Unfortunately for them, Justin Verlander had other ideas.
The dominant Astros’ starter hurled six one-run innings, and a late offensive surge gave the Astros all the runs they would need in a 4-1 win.
The game’s scoring commenced in the fourth, when Gorkys Hernandez tripled off Verlander and scored on a Buster Posey sacrifice fly. In the bottom of the frame, however, the Astros evened the score when Andrew McCutchen missed a Yuli Gurriel fly ball, earning an error and allowing Carlos Correa to score all the way from first.
The Astros added on in the fifth when George Springer crushed a two-run homer to the Crawford boxes in left field, scoring ninth-place hitter Tony Kemp, who had walked in the at-bat before Springer. Jose Altuve later singled, stole second, and scored on a Correa bloop single to left, widening the deficit to 4-1 and knocking Giants’ starter Jeff Samardzija out of the game. Reliever Will Smith induced a flyout to center by Marwin Gonzalez to end the inning.
Samardzija, who threw 97 pitches in 4.2 innings pitched, largely matched Verlander until the fifth inning, locating his fastball and utilizing a surprisingly good curveball.
Verlander, meanwhile, who entered Wednesday’s game coming off a 118-pitch complete-game shutout in his last start, was once again nearly unhittable, pairing his well-located high-velocity fastball with an effective curveball, slider, and changeup. His relief pitching did just as well, shutting the Giants out in the latter three innings.
After two straight wins against the Rockies to split that series, the Giants have now been swept in the Houston half of their four-game split series with the Astros. Wednesday’s loss drops them to 24-26, 2.5 games back of the Colorado Rockies, who are currently in sole possession of first place in the NL West.