Miami Marlins at Houston Astros

The Astros’ best hitters, Yordan Alvarez and Jeremy Peña, carried the weight offensively Monday night, and starting pitcher Ronel Blanco provided a glimpse of how he can help the club moving forward in his return to the mound for the first time in 429 days. Alvarez smashed his 32nd and 33rd homers of the season to keep up his American League Triple Crown pace, Peña hit a grand slam and Blanco struck out eight batters in 4 2/3 innings to lead the Astros to an 8-5 win over the Marlins at Daikin Park, snapping a four-game losing streak. Houston scored two more runs Monday than it did in getting swept in three games by the Orioles over the weekend. “It was a tough series that we just played,” Peña said. “We flushed that and we showed up today to win a game and we’ll keep going with the momentum and show up tomorrow and try to win another game. Hopefully this snowballs and we keep going.” Here are three key storylines from the win: **Alvarez ties Schwarber** Alvarez scorched the ball, with three of the four highest exit velocities of the game. After hitting a first-inning single that was 114.2 mph off the bat, he followed Peña’s slam with a homer in the second that was 113.8 mph and traveled a Statcast-estimated 428 feet. He led off the fifth with a 419-foot homer that was 108.5 mph off the bat. “Just locked in,” Astros manager Joe Espada said. “What he’s doing right now, he’s in a different league.” He’s now tied with Philadelphia's Kyle Schwarber for the Major League home run lead and is one behind St. Louis’ Jordan Walker for the RBI lead with 75. Alvarez is slashing .324/.432/.651 in 100 games played this season, including .407/.471/.881 since June 30. That’s a 1.352 OPS over 15 games. “He covers a lot of pitches, and he hits both sides extremely well,” Marlins manager Clayton McCullough said. “He can hit velocity. He can hit spin. There’s not a whole lot of places where you can consistently go, so you’re just trying to keep him off balance as best as you can. He’s going to have nights like this because he’s a really special hitter.”