Houston hosts Texas, looks to build on Valdez's solid outing

Updated Jun. 15, 2021 3:20 a.m. ET

share

facebookxredditlink

Texas Rangers (25-41, fifth in the AL West) vs. Houston Astros (37-28, second in the AL West)

Houston; Tuesday, 8:10 p.m. EDT

PITCHING PROBABLES: Rangers: Kyle Gibson (4-0, 2.14 ERA, 1.01 WHIP, 58 strikeouts) Astros: Lance McCullers Jr. (3-1, 2.96 ERA, 1.16 WHIP, 59 strikeouts)

LINE: Astros -179, Rangers +154; over/under is 8 1/2 runs

BOTTOM LINE: Houston heads into the matchup fresh off a strong showing by Framber Valdez. Valdez threw seven innings, giving up one run on five hits with two strikeouts against Minnesota.

The Astros are 21-12 against teams from the AL West. Houston has slugged .445, good for second in the American League. Yuli Gurriel leads the team with a .536 slugging percentage, including 27 extra-base hits and 10 home runs.

The Rangers have gone 8-14 against division opponents. Texas has a team on-base percentage of .299, led by Joey Gallo with a mark of .377.

The Rangers won the last meeting 3-2. John King notched his fifth victory and Nick Solak went 1-for-5 with a double and an RBI for Texas. Ryan Pressly took his first loss for Houston.

TOP PERFORMERS: Gurriel leads the Astros with 47 RBIs and is batting .323.

Adolis Garcia leads the Rangers with 22 extra base hits and 46 RBIs.

LAST 10 GAMES: Astros: 6-4, .320 batting average, 3.83 ERA, outscored opponents by 24 runs

Rangers: 3-7, .237 batting average, 5.42 ERA, outscored by 22 runs

INJURIES: Astros: Justin Verlander: (elbow), Joe Smith: (undisclosed), Austin Pruitt: (elbow), Enoli Paredes: (shoulder), Lance McCullers Jr.: (shoulder), Josh James: (hip), Kent Emanuel: (elbow), Pedro Baez: (right shoulder), Bryan Abreu: (calf), Aledmys Diaz: (hand), Jason Castro: (achilles).

Rangers: Hunter Wood: (elbow), Jose Leclerc: (elbow), Ian Kennedy: (hamstring), Jonathan Hernandez: (elbow), Kyle Cody: (right shoulder), Matt Bush: (elbow), Kohei Arihara: (finger), David Dahl: (rib), Ronald Guzman: (knee), Sam Huff: (hamstring).

___

The Associated Press created this story using technology provided by Data Skrive and data from Sportradar.

share

in this topic

Bryan Abreu

Pedro Báez

Kent Emanuel

Josh James

Enoli Paredes

Austin Pruitt

Joe Smith

Ronald Guzmán

David Dahl

Justin Verlander

Adolis García

Ryan Pressly

Kyle Cody

Jonathan Hernández

Ian Kennedy

José Leclerc

Hunter Wood

Jason Castro

Aledmys Díaz

Nick Solak

John King

Joey Gallo

Yuli Gurriel

Sam Huff

Lance McCullers

Kyle Gibson

Framber Valdez

Texas Rangers

Houston Astros