Willi Castro had two hits in Colorado’s eight-run fifth inning, Tyler Johnston homered among his three hits, and the Colorado Rockies beat the Houston Astros 9-7 in Denver on Monday night.
Edouard Julien and TJ Rumfield had two hits each and Juan Mejia picked up his first save of the season for Colorado, which has won two in a row after dropping its first two games of its opening homestand.
Jose Altuve had three hits, Cam Smith finished with two hits, including a home run, and Christian Walker, Jeremy Pena and Jake Meyers also had two hits for Houston.
The Astros jumped ahead in the first inning with a two-out rally against starter Ryan Feltner (1-0). Altuve and Carlos Correa doubled and Walker singled to make it 2-0.
Smith hit a solo homer in the fourth inning to give Houston a 3-0 lead, but the Rockies rallied in the fifth.
Castro singled and Brenton Doyle walked to open the inning, and both moved up on a sacrifice bunt by Jake McCarthy. Ryan Weiss (0-1) replaced starter Cody Bolton, who was hit hard in allowing two runs on three hits with two walks and striking out five in 4 1/3 innings.
Kyle Karros walked to load the bases, Julien hit a two-run single and Hunter Goodman tied it with an RBI single an out later.
Johnston’s double put Colorado ahead and Rumfield brought home two more with a triple to left. He scored on Castro’s second single of the inning. Doyle reached on a fielder’s choice and Karros singled to cap the eight-run inning.
The Astros got a run back against Feltner in the sixth on a sacrifice fly by Joey Loperfido but Johnston answered with a solo homer in the bottom of the inning, his second of the season.
Feltner allowed four runs on seven hits in 5 1/3 innings with two walks and a strikeout.
Pena reached on a one-out double in the seventh and scored on Altuve’s single to cut it to 9-5 and Houston scored two more runs in the eighth on Loperfido’s RBI groundout and a run-scoring single by Yainer Diaz.
