Jake Meyers homered for three in a seven-run inning, and the Astros beat Kevin Gausman and the Toronto Blue Jays 9-2 on Monday night.
Meyers and Corey Julks finished with two hits and three RBIs for the Astros, who lost two of three games to the Texas Rangers last weekend. Cristian Javier (2-0) pitched five innings, conceding just one run.
“It gave me a bit more confidence and kept me calm,” Javier said of the early lead. Even though I conceded a point, I knew we still had a good lead. »
José Abreu started the Astros by scoring a two-running double. After Kyle Tucker walked and Jeremy Pena reached the goal on an interference from receiver Danny Jansen, Julks made it 4-0 with another two-run double.
Meyers then hit his first long pitch of the season, ending a prolific seven-run first inning.
“It was strong. We haven’t had a first round like this for a long time. We always talk about taking them out early and we finally did it,” Astros manager Dusty Baker said.
Gausman (1-2) gave up eight runs, seven earned, and seven hits in four 2/3 innings. He struck out five batters and walked two.
“He kind of got tricked,” Blue Jays manager John Schneider said. They had a very obvious approach with his fastball and slingshot. They weren’t fooled, so he got tricked early on. Their team was really waiting for a specific area, and he made some mistakes too, in the middle of the area, but yeah, that was an unusual first for him. »
The seven-run first inning was where Gausman took the most runs of his entire career. At the same time, it’s the most prolific first inning for the Astros since August 2020.
Matt Chapman homered for the Blue Jays in the second inning, and Santiago Espinal also in the eighth inning.
