Chicago White Sox at Houston Astros

The four singles the White Sox pieced together against Astros starter Hunter Brown in the second inning of Wednesday afternoon’s game had an average exit velocity of 80 mph, including two infield hits. Chicago pushed across a pair of runs and forced Brown to throw 28 pitches in the inning. “Honestly, I was kind of dragging my blanket a little bit after the second inning,” Brown said. “I couldn’t believe that. I’m better than that, than to do that. That was unbelievable, honestly.” Another infield hit to start the third by Miguel Vargas and a walk to Andrew Benintendi is when Brown decided he had enough. No more soft contact. No more contact of any kind, at least for the rest of the third. Brown picked up his blanket, tied it around his neck and turned it into a cape. Brown responded by striking out the final three hitters in the third en route to sending down 11 of the final 12 hitters he faced to complete six strong innings and send the Astros to a 6-2 win over the White Sox at Daikin Park.  “I really was not happy about that inning,” Brown said. “It cost me, like, 100 pitches in that inning alone. Obviously, that’s hyperbole. I don’t know if I got angry? I was just better than that. I felt I was better than them, and that’s kind of my mindset there.” Brown, who missed 2 1/2 months earlier in the season with a right shoulder strain, will be as important to the Astros’ postseason chances as any player in the final 21 games of the regular season. Those playoff chances got a big boost with the Astros taking three of four games from the American League Central-leading White Sox to pull within 1 1/2 games of the No. 2 playoff seed in the AL. The division winner with the second-best record would get the No. 2 seed in the AL, which comes with a bye into the Division Series. “Why not?” said Brown, who’s allowed three earned runs over 12 2/3 innings in his past two starts.