HOUSTON — When Astros pitcher Hunter Brown hit Minnesota’s Matt Wallner with a full-count curveball Sunday in Minneapolis, supervisor Dusty Baker later pulled him apart and supplied some recommendation. Call it a teachable second, if you’ll.
“Dusty came to me and said, ‘Hey man, you’ve got to decide when that is the right pitch,’” Brown mentioned.
So when Rangers first baseman Nathaniel Lowe got here to the plate Saturday night time with the bases loaded and one out within the third inning, Brown confirmed confidence in his energy curve whereas displaying the heart of a tightrope walker. Lowe swung via the bender for a key strikeout within the Astros’ 8-2 win over the Rangers at Minute Maid Park.
“I think in that spot, it was the right pitch. I had to execute it, and I did,” Brown mentioned. “There’s confidence in understanding when is the time to take the prospect and when just isn’t. And he is a very good hitter.”
For the second begin in a row, he didn’t enable an earned run in seven innings, decreasing his ERA to 1.93 via 18 2/3 innings this 12 months. He’s the primary Astros pitcher since Scott Kazmir (2015) to not quit an earned run in back-to-back begins of least seven innings, and he’s the one pitcher within the Majors to do it this 12 months.
“He’s pitching with a lot of determination, a lot of fire and making pitches when he had to,” Baker mentioned. “We had that one inning where we didn’t play too well on defense. The first thing he says when he comes in is, ‘Hey, we got a lot of game left.’ That’s a very mature statement. He’s pitching great. The key in that game is that 3-2 curveball. It takes a lot of confidence and nerve to throw that to a real good hitter.”
Brown certainly walked a tightrope above catastrophe within the third inning, when a fielding error by second baseman Mauricio Dubón sparked a Rangers rally. An in depth name at first that wasn’t overturned on replay and a success batter solely prolonged the inning, however the strikeout of Lowe was huge. Adolis García adopted with an infield hit, however Brown dug deep for a strikeout of Josh Jung to finish the inning.
“There was a lot of ballgame left,” Brown mentioned. “Plus, typically you simply get baseballed. Some stuff occurs, and also you’ve acquired to battle via it and attempt to win the sport.”
Innings like that may usually derail a pitcher, however Brown shook it off and wound up retiring 12 of the ultimate 14 batters he confronted. He slapped his glove in pleasure when he got here off the mound after the highest of the seventh after which watched the Astros rating 5 occasions within the backside of the inning. That included a bases-loaded stroll to Yordan Alvarez, giving him 20 RBIs for the season, and a two-run double by Jeremy Peña.
“I made a good pitch to [Marcus] Semien, and he got a ground ball I was looking for and ended up getting through,” Brown mentioned whereas dissecting the third. “[With] García, I made a very good pitch to him, and he hit a weak floor ball and finally ends up getting a success. That sort of stuff you may’t management. You management the pitches that you simply make, and that’s what you deal with.”
Brown threw 99 pitches and averaged 98.2 mph on his fastball. He threw extra sliders (39) than fastballs (30) for the second begin in a row, and it was additionally the second begin in a row he’s labored with rookie catcher Yainer Diaz, who caught him in Triple-A.
“His breaking balls usually get a lot of ground balls,” Diaz mentioned. “Today he was leaving them just a little bit up and was getting just a little extra firmer contact. What I informed him was [to] throw them just a little extra down, so we are able to get the contact that we would like.”
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