Houston Astros Christian Walker (8) reacts in the dugout with designated hitter Yordan Alvarez (44) after hitting a solo home run during the fifth inning of an MLB baseball game in Houston, Friday, July 31, 2026.
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Houston Astros Yainer Diaz hits a solo home run during the seventh inning of an MLB baseball game in Houston, Friday, July 31, 2026.
Jason Fochtman/Houston Chronicle
Houston Astros Yainer Diaz, right, celebrates with Cam Smith after his solo home run during the seventh inning of an MLB baseball game in Houston, Friday, July 31, 2026.
Jason Fochtman/Houston Chronicle
Houston Astros designated hitter Yordan Alvarez (44) reacts after being intentionally walked during the eighth inning of an MLB baseball game in Houston, Friday, July 31, 2026.
Jason Fochtman/Houston Chronicle
Houston Astros designated hitter Yordan Alvarez (44) reacts after being intentionally walked during the eighth inning of an MLB baseball game in Houston, Friday, July 31, 2026.
Jason Fochtman/Houston Chronicle
Houston Astros relief pitcher AJ Blubaugh (69) delivers during the eighth inning of an MLB baseball game in Houston, Friday, July 31, 2026.
Jason Fochtman/Houston Chronicle
Houston Astros relief pitcher AJ Blubaugh (69) delivers during the eighth inning of an MLB baseball game in Houston, Friday, July 31, 2026.
Jason Fochtman/Houston Chronicle
Houston Astros Christian Walker, right, celebrates with Isaac Paredes after hitting a solo home run during the fifth inning of an MLB baseball game in Houston, Friday, July 31, 2026.
Jason Fochtman/Houston Chronicle
Houston Astros pitcher Enyel de Los Santos (65) delivers during the sixth inning of an MLB baseball game in Houston, Friday, July 31, 2026.
Jason Fochtman/Houston Chronicle
during the sixth inning of an MLB baseball game in Houston, Friday, July 31, 2026.
Jason Fochtman/Houston Chronicle
Houston Astros Christian Walker (8) smiles after hitting a solo home run during the fifth inning of an MLB baseball game in Houston, Friday, July 31, 2026.
Jason Fochtman/Houston Chronicle
Houston Astros Christian Walker (8) hits a solo home run during the fifth inning of an MLB baseball game in Houston, Friday, July 31, 2026.
Jason Fochtman/Houston Chronicle
Houston Astros starting pitcher Hunter Brown (58) is seen in the dugout during the fifth inning of an MLB baseball game in Houston, Friday, July 31, 2026.
Jason Fochtman/Houston Chronicle
Houston Astros left fielder LaMonte Wade Jr. (31) fields a fly ball by Texas Rangers Wyatt Langford during the first inning of an MLB baseball game in Houston, Friday, July 31, 2026.
Jason Fochtman/Houston Chronicle
Houston Astros starting pitcher Hunter Brown (58) delivers during the first inning of an MLB baseball game in Houston, Friday, July 31, 2026.
Jason Fochtman/Houston Chronicle
Houston Astros starting pitcher Hunter Brown (58) delivers during the first inning of an MLB baseball game in Houston, Friday, July 31, 2026.
Jason Fochtman/Houston Chronicle
Houston Astros closer Josh Hader, left, talks pitching with fellow pitcher Tatsuya Imai before an MLB baseball game in Houston, Friday, July 31, 2026.
Jason Fochtman/Houston Chronicle
Houston Astros closer Josh Hader, left, talks pitching with fellow pitcher Tatsuya Imai before an MLB baseball game in Houston, Friday, July 31, 2026.
Jason Fochtman/Houston Chronicle
Houston Astros closer Josh Hader, left, talks pitching with fellow pitcher Tatsuya Imai before an MLB baseball game in Houston, Friday, July 31, 2026.
Jason Fochtman/Houston Chronicle
Houston Astros closer Josh Hader, left, talks pitching with fellow pitcher Tatsuya Imai before an MLB baseball game in Houston, Friday, July 31, 2026.
Jason Fochtman/Houston Chronicle
Houston Astros closer Josh Hader, right, talks pitching with fellow pitcher Tatsuya Imai before an MLB baseball game in Houston, Friday, July 31, 2026.
Jason Fochtman/Houston Chronicle
Houston Astros closer Josh Hader, right, talks pitching with fellow pitcher Tatsuya Imai before an MLB baseball game in Houston, Friday, July 31, 2026.
Jason Fochtman/Houston Chronicle
Houston Astros pitcher Tatsuya Imai is seen before an MLB baseball game in Houston, Friday, July 31, 2026.
Jason Fochtman/Houston Chronicle
Houston Astros pitcher Tatsuya Imai is seen before an MLB baseball game in Houston, Friday, July 31, 2026.
Jason Fochtman/Houston Chronicle
Houston Astros pitcher Tatsuya Imai is seen before an MLB baseball game in Houston, Friday, July 31, 2026.
Jason Fochtman/Houston Chronicle
For the first time since the opening week of April, the Houston Astros are atop the American League West.
The Astros got there by pummeling the rival Texas Rangers 11-2 on Friday night at Daikin Park in a win that may prove just as important for the end-of-season tiebreaker as it does for the current standings. Houston clinched the season series with its seventh victory over the Rangers in 11 tries. The teams meet just two more times, both at Daikin Park this weekend. The Astros won the AL West over the Rangers in 2023 by virtue of the tiebreaker and missed out on the playoffs for the first time in nine years last season, because it lost the head-to-head tiebreaker with the Detroit Tigers.
For now, the Astros will settle for being able to look up the standings on their phone and seeing their name on the top line.
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“Still a lot of baseball to be played, but it’s important to recognize those guys in (that clubhouse),” Astros manager Joe Espada said. “We worked really, really hard to get to this point. We have battled injuries, some ups and downs, and they just come to work every day with the right attitude, the right mindset. They’re tough, they stay together. I’m just proud of our effort. There’s still baseball to be played, but we paused in there to remind them that we worked really hard to get here, but we’ve got to do it again tomorrow.”
It was the same message delivered by the players, who had some celebratory music being played, as is customary after wins, but there wasn’t much back-patting over a win on the last day of July.
“This is not time to let off the gas, it’s time to keep playing ball,” said Jeremy Peña, went 3-for-5 with 3 RBIs. “There’s a lot of season left and we know what can happen in two months, so we’ve got to keep it going and keep playing good baseball.”
The Astros, who moved to one game over .500 for the first time since April 6, certainly did that in the series opener against their division rivals doing it with the formula it’s used so often in the past: Hunter Brown pitched well and Yordan Alvarez and Peña delivered big hits. Yainer Diaz also came through with his second straight four-hit night.
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Brown (3-1) held the Rangers scoreless through five innings before allowing a couple runs in the sixth when he already was staked to a 6-0 lead. The Astros ace lasted 5 ⅔ innings, giving up two runs on six hits and two walks with five strikeouts.
Nathan Eovaldi (10-9) wasn’t nearly as good for the Rangers. The Astros got to him in the second inning with three straight one-out hits, including a Taylor Trammell double on a squibber down the third-base line, a Diaz single up the middle and a LaMonte Wade Jr., double scorched to right for a 1-0 lead. After Cam Smith was robbed of extra bases that would have scored a couple by a diving stop from third baseman Ezequiel Duran, Eovaldi hit Peña to load the bases for Alvarez.
With the crowd roaring, after it had finished booing the hit by pitch, Alvarez got a splitter over the heart of the plate that he ripped with a 107.2 mph exit velocity for a two-run single that put the Astros up 3-0.
The offense struck again two innings later when Smith delivered a two-out triple to right, and Peña brought him home with a base hit up the middle.
Eovaldi gave up back-to-back home runs to Paredes and Christian Walker in the fifth. The Alvin native gave up six runs and 10 hits in five innings.
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The Astros lit up reliever Luis Curvelo for four runs in the seventh, including a Diaz home run, a two-run double by Peña and an RBI single from Paredes.
With the rout on, AJ Blubaugh and Bryan King pitched the final two innings in relief, allowing the Astros to give high-leverage relievers Bryan Abreu, Steven Okert and Josh Hader an extra day off with two more crucial games remaining in the series.
Astros win the Silver Boot… again
As a team, the Astros care much more about the tiebreaker implications of winning a season series over the Rangers than they do about a Silver Boot trophy, but the trophy comes along with it.
The Silver Boot has resided in Houston since 2017 with the Astros topping the Rangers in the season series nine out of 10 years. The two teams split the season series in 2020, but the trophy stayed in Houston as the previous winners.
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“I don’t even know, is there a real trophy?” Brown laughed when jokingly asked if he planned to party with the Silver Boot. “I haven’t seen it.”
Of course, Rangers fans will probably take what happened in 2023, when their team lost the season series, but then eliminated the Astros in a tense seven-game American League Championship Series and went on to win the franchise’s first World Series.
Yordan Alvarez’s Triple Crown hunt
There’s only been one Triple Crown winner in the past 59 years, but the Astros slugger is on track with two months left in the regular season. With his 2-for-3 and two RBI night, Alvarez now has a pretty sizeable lead in the American League in all three major categories: Batting average, home runs and RBIs. He’s hitting .324 with 35 home runs and 82 RBIs. The Rays’ Yandy Diaz is second in the AL in averaging, hitting .302. Next up in home runs and RBIs is the Yankees’ Ben Rice with 31 and 73, respectively.
Detroit Tigers’ sure-fire Hall of Famer Miguel Cabrera is the last player to win the Triple Crown, doing so in 2012. No one had done it before him since Carl Yastrzemski in 1967.
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Jeremy Peña’s hitting streak
Peña’s fourth-inning single extended his hitting streak to 12 games, which is the third-longest of his career behind 13- and 14-game hitting streaks he had last season. The 28-year-old shortstop is hitting .431 (22-for-51) with six home runs and 11 RBIs in that 12-game stretch that began right after the All-Star break.
Peña actually has hit safely in 19 out of 20 games dating back to June 24, hitting .381 (32-for-84) in that time that was broken up by a short stay on the injured list with a calf strain.
Peña, who can become a free agent after next season, is having the best season of his career. After hitting a career-best .304 with an .840 OPS last season, he currently is batting .317 with 12 home runs and an .878 OPS.