Yordan Alvarez slugs 3 homers as Astros shut out A’s and clinch playoff spot

Bat met ball and no one in the ballpark had any doubts of its destination. Yordan Alvarez admired his handiwork for a second before beginning a slow jog on a night full of them. His teammates spilled from the dugout in between states of disbelief and delirium. Four innings still remained, but their most powerful slugger secured the team’s foremost goal.

A regular season defined by run prevention and power surges will stretch into October. The Astros secured their sixth straight postseason berth in the type of game befitting the 144 that preceded it. Four home runs buoyed a brilliant pitching performance.

Three came from Alvarez, the team’s hulking slugger who has transformed from elite to extraordinary. He struck three home runs in the Astros’ 5-0 win against Oakland on Friday, the final one a 464-foot, fifth-inning blast that brought a crowd of 33,850 to a crescendo.

Alvarez authored the 15th three-homer game in franchise history. Of the 11 Astros to accomplish it, only Alvarez, Jeff Bagwell and Glenn Davis have done it more than once. Four years ago, Alvarez struck three home runs during a 23-2 bludgeoning of the Baltimore Orioles at Camden Yards.

One of those three bombs arrived against Stevie Wilkerson, an Orioles position player trying to procure the final three outs of a blowout. Alvarez inflicted all of his damage on Friday against A’s starter Adrián Martinez, a rookie righthander who flummoxed most of the eight Astros around him.

Alvarez is the first player in Astros history to hit three home runs off the same pitcher in a game. For four innings, Alvarez represented the Astros’ only threat against Oakland’s rookie righthander. Houston entered the fifth with two hits — both solo home runs from Alvarez.

Martinez stranded four baserunners across his first four frames. He kept the leadoff man off base in four of the five frames he worked. He started the third with a walk to Jose Altuve, but Jeremy Peña bounced into a 5-4-3 double play that erased it.

Five pitches later, Alvarez pounded a flat changeup onto the gas pump pavilion in left-center field. The baseball traveled 431 feet — the shortest home run of this superb night. He hit it a mere 108.7 mph off the bat. Both of his other bombs carried exit velocities of at least 110 mph.

It staked Justin Verlander to a two-run lead. He turned it into something insurmountable. A 17-day absence did nothing to derail the Astros’ ageless ace. Verlander fired five hitless innings against a hapless Oakland lineup. He struck out nine and allowed two baserunners — one via walk and another after a hit by pitch.

Verlander struck out six of the first hitters he faced. He harnessed wonderful command of his slider against an A’s lineup that featured six righthanded hitters. Thirty-one of Verlander’s 79 pitches were sliders. He generated eight whiffs and received six called strikes against it. Six of his nine strikeouts concluded upon it.

Oakland offered a feeble test of Verlander’s true effectiveness. The team boasts baseball’s lowest batting average, on-base percentage and sits just two points ahead of Detroit with its second-lowest OPS. In no way was this a fair fight, but Verlander dominated in a way aces should. The A’s struck just six balls in play against him. None were hit harder than 98 mph.

Verlander could have chased history under conventional circumstances. The A’s appeared lifeless against him, the sort of mismatch that screams no-hitter. Verlander operated on a pitch count, making the endeavor impossible.

Verlander required 24 pitches to finish the fourth. He walked cleanup man Seth Brown, but reached back for a 96.8 mph four-seamer to strike out Ramón Laureano and strand him. Verlander averaged 95.2 mph on the 29 four-seam fastballs he threw — a tick above his pre-injured list average.

Verlander returned for the fifth and ravaged the bottom of Oakland’s abysmal offense. He sandwiched two strikeouts around an infield fly and left the mound after 13 pitches. At 79 total, his evening had concluded.

Starting pitchers often descend into the clubhouse after they exit games. Verlander draped a towel over his neck and stayed on the bench for the fifth. Perhaps he peeked at the scoreboard and saw the situation. Due up third? Alvarez, a man for whom no one in any audience should leave.

Martinez made surprisingly quick work of Altuve, striking him out on five pitches. A mistake came two pitches later. He hung a slider to a man who struggles against them. Peña pulverized the mistake onto the train tracks 408 feet away — a cathartic home run for a young player being pounded with sliders down and away the entire season.

Peña crossed home plate and provided Alvarez the sort of stage he loves to seize. He saw one pitch — a sinker that refused to sink. The 94.1 mph offering stayed at his letters. Alvarez brought his hands through the strike zone, took a vicious hack and watched it fly high into the Houston night.

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