Houston Astros take 4-3 win over Los Angeles Dodgers in last inning - MLB Update
Michael Bourn tied the game and Hunter Pence touched a leading score in the ninth inning as the Houston Astros overpowered the Los Angeles Dodgers 4-3 in a close confrontational game at the Minute Maid Park on Monday night, May 23.
The Astros trailed 3-1 in the bottom of the ninth inning, when centre-fielder Bourn entered the plate for his fourth at-bat and struck strongly to right-field for a much-needed RBI double to balance the game 3-all.
Pence, who called an 11-pitch key walk by Angel Sanchez earlier in the inning, drove in a single to shallow left side of the field for a game-winning run on the last pitch of the fixture.
"Outstanding at-bat," Pence talking about Sanchez’s longest at-bat said. "That does a lot more than the box score will ever show. Whenever you work an at-bat like that with that, many pitches with two strikes down in the count you have to think of it like
running 11 sprints for the pitcher. Then you get on base it's kind of deflating."
By the time Pence landed at the plate, the Dodgers’ closer Kenley Jansen had already tossed 36 pitches. Tired Jansen then threw a shaky pitch to receive a defeat-earning run.
The Dodgers’ manager Don Mattingly still expressed his confidence on Jansen despite his worse outing.
"He threw the ball good tonight," Don said. "It was that kid, Sanchez that had a good at-bat against him. He kept on throwing strikes, but he kept fouling balls off. He walks him and gets Bourn up there. The biggest thing today is that he didn't get ahead
in the count."
The Dodgers’ Matt Kemp broke a scoreless tie in the second inning with a 408-feet long one-run homer off the Astros’ starter Bud Norris. However, the Astros’ Humberto Quintero tied the game 1-all in the next inning with an RBI single off Dodgers’ starter
Clayton Kershaw.
Both Kershaw and Norris then struck back and held the batters to no-score until the seventh inning when Norris gave away two more runs. The Dodgers’ Andre Ethier blistered to centre-field for an RBI double to take his team to a 3-1 lead.
That finished Norris’ game with three runs on six hits, three walks and five strike-outs over seven innings.
Kershaw however did not yield any run in his five later innings to confirm his sixth win of the season, which he could not enjoy due to Jansen’s last inning. Kershaw also took out seven batters allowing just two walks and managed his ERA to 2.96.
Relievers’ Mike MacDougal and Matt Guerrier each tossed a perfect single inning.
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