{"id":616635,"date":"2026-05-01T05:12:20","date_gmt":"2026-05-01T05:12:20","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/616635\/"},"modified":"2026-05-01T05:12:20","modified_gmt":"2026-05-01T05:12:20","slug":"astros-alvarez-ends-april-with-12th-hr-to-tie-for-mlb-lead","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/616635\/","title":{"rendered":"Astros’ Alvarez ends April with 12th HR to tie for MLB lead"},"content":{"rendered":"

BALTIMORE — Yordan Alvarez<\/a> went 3-for-4 with his 12th homer and scored three runs as the Houston Astros<\/a> beat the Baltimore Orioles<\/a> 11-5 to split a doubleheader Thursday.<\/p>\n

Lance McCullers Jr<\/a>. (2-2) pitched six innings, allowing three runs and two hits. He struck out nine and walked four.<\/p>\n

Cam Smith<\/a> launched an early three-run homer and Yainer Diaz<\/a> got three hits for the Astros, who finished with 15 to salvage the finale of the three-game series. Leody Taveras<\/a> had a two-run double, and Isaac Paredes<\/a> went 5-for-10 in the doubleheader.<\/p>\n

Adley Rutschman<\/a> and Jeremiah Jackson<\/a> each hit a grand slam in the opener to help the Orioles cruise to a 10-3 win. Chris Bassitt<\/a> (2-2) tossed 6 innings for his longest outing this season and allowed one run on seven hits.<\/p>\n

Houston outhit Baltimore 27-12 in the twin bill.<\/p>\n

In the second game, the Astros sent nine batters to the plate in the first inning and jumped on Baltimore starter Brandon Young<\/a> for five runs, two on a single by Dustin Harris<\/a> and three on Smith’s homer.<\/p>\n

Alvarez, whose 13-game hitting streak ended in the opener, made it 6-0 with a solo homer in the second. He became the third player in the majors to reach 12 homers this season, joining theNew York Yankees<\/a>‘ Aaron Judge<\/a> and theChicago White Sox<\/a>‘s Munetaka Murakami<\/a>, the most players to reach that mark before May in a season, according to ESPN Research.<\/p>\n

Alvarez’s 12 homers are also an Astros record for most long balls in a season before May.<\/p>\n

Houston batted around again in the fourth, adding four runs with the aid of three hits, two walks, a sacrifice fly and an Orioles error.<\/p>\n

Young (2-1) allowed 10 runs — seven earned — and 10 hits over four innings.<\/p>\n

Peter Lambert<\/a> (1-2) took the loss in the first game after giving up two runs and two hits in 4 innings.<\/p>\n

Baltimore manager Craig Albernaz said before the opener that left-hander Trevor Rogers<\/a>, placed on the 15-day injured list Wednesday, has flu.<\/p>\n

The Associated Press contributed to this report.<\/p>\n

Copyright \u00a9 2026 ESPN Internet Ventures. All rights reserved.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"BALTIMORE — Yordan Alvarez went 3-for-4 with his 12th homer and scored three runs as the Houston Astros…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":616636,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[65],"tags":[267597,97262,352,373,363,3,99],"class_list":["post-616635","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-mlb","tag-267597","tag-alvarez-yordan","tag-espn","tag-houston-astros","tag-mlb","tag-news","tag-sports"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/616635","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=616635"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/616635\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/616636"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=616635"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=616635"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=616635"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}