Red-hot A’s keep Astros from making up ground in wild-card race

Jacob Wilson and Tyler Soderstrom each had two hits and one RBI to help the Athletics hand the Houston Astros a damaging 5-1 loss Tuesday night in West Sacramento, Calif.

BY FIELD LEVEL MEDIA

Sep 24, 2025, 12:49 AM Updated: 12:49 am

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Jacob Wilson and Tyler Soderstrom each had two hits and one RBI to help the Athletics hand the Houston Astros a damaging 5-1 loss Tuesday night in West Sacramento, Calif.

Darell Hernaiz also had an RBI hit and Jeffrey Springs and three relievers combined on a three-hitter for the Athletics (74-83). Wilson also walked twice and scored twice as the A’s won for the eighth time in the past 11 games.

Cam Smith drove in the lone run for the Astros (84-73), who lost their fourth consecutive contest. Christian Walker had two hits.

Houston sits one game behind the Detroit Tigers (85-72) for the final American League wild-card berth.

The Astros fell to four games behind Seattle (88-69) in the AL West with five games left. The Mariners also hold the tiebreaker after posting a three-game sweep of Houston over the weekend.

Springs (11-11) gave up one run on three hits over five innings. He struck out three and walked two.

Tyler Ferguson pitched two perfect innings and Justin Sterner induced a double-play grounder from Jose Altuve while tossing a hitless eighth. Michael Kelly finished up with a scoreless ninth.

Houston’s Cristian Javier (2-4) allowed four runs (three earned) and six hits over 4 2/3 innings. He struck out four and walked one.

The A’s took the lead for good in the fourth inning as Wilson doubled with one out and scored when a blooper by Hernaiz fell into shallow left-center field beyond the reach of Astros shortstop Mauricio Dubon for a 2-1 edge.

The Athletics tacked on two runs in the fifth to make it 4-1.

Brett Harris had a leadoff double and scored on Soderstrom’s two-out double. After Brent Rooker walked, Wilson stroked an RBI single to right off Jayden Murray.

The A’s got an insurance run in the eighth when Wilson scored on a sacrifice fly by Carlos Cortes.

The Athletics pushed across an unearned run in the first inning.

Nick Kurtz led off with a double, and two outs later, Rooker hit what looked to be an inning-ending popup down the first base line. Astros first baseman Walker apparently couldn’t locate the ball in the sun, and Javier made a late effort to catch it but was unable to as Kurtz came around to score.

Houston loaded the bases with no outs in the second but managed just one run, that coming on Smith’s sacrifice fly for the second out of the inning. Dubon struck out swinging to end the rally.

–Field Level Media

More A’s & MLB coverage on Sactown Sports

Automated ball-strike challenges are coming to Major League Baseball next season.

A Tuesday vote from the MLB Joint Competition Committee, an 11-person group that includes six team owners, four players and one umpire, made the proposed rule change official.

“The previous rule changes that have been adopted by the Joint Competition Committee have had staying power and created momentum for the game. We used the same process with ABS that started with listening to fans, conducting extensive testing at the minor league level, and trying at every step to make the game better,” MLB commissioner Rob Manfred said in a statement.

“Throughout this process we have worked on deploying the system in a way that’s acceptable to players. The strong preference from players for the challenge format over using the technology to call every pitch was a key factor in determining the system we are announcing today.”

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