Yainer Diaz homered, Cristian Javier matched his season high in strikeouts, and the Houston Astros claimed the opener of their three-game interleague series against the visiting Arizona Diamondbacks with a 3-1 victory on Friday.
Javier (2-5) allowed one run on one hit with three walks and eight strikeouts in five innings.
Josh Hader struck out the side in the ninth inning for his 23rd save of the season, making him the 41st player in history to record 250 career saves.
The Astros (73-69) reached their top mark for games over .500 this season by winning for the seventh time in their past nine games. Houston improved to 4-1 on its current seven-game homestand.
Arizona (74-68) took its fourth loss in five games.
Diaz keyed the Astros’ three-run third inning with a leadoff blast to left field off Merrill Kelly (9-13). The Houston catcher lined a 1-0 slider 383 feet for his 11th home run of the season and a 1-0 lead.
Kelly responded by striking out LaMonte Wade Jr., but the Astros Jeremy Pena and Yordan Alvarez followed with singles. Isaac Paredes hit an RBI double, and Jose Altuve plated Alvarez with a sacrifice fly to left field, extending the Astros’ advantage to 3-0.
The third inning represented the lone hiccup for Kelly. He surrendered just two more hits, both singles, and did not allow another baserunner to reach scoring position. Kelly worked six innings, allowing three runs on seven hits and no walks while striking out four.
Javier fanned a pair of batters in the top of the first inning and sidestepped a leadoff walk to Ketel Marte in the second. He struck out Corbin Carroll for a second time to strand Geraldo Perdomo at second in the third and added two strikeouts in both the fourth and fifth innings.
Gabriel Moreno smacked his 12th home run leading off the fourth, a 387-foot drive to left-center, to smear Javier’s line.
Astros relievers Enyel De Los Santos, Bennett Sousa, Bryan Abreu and Hader preserved the lead. Abreu benefited from a nifty double play started by Pena in the eighth. The shortstop fielded a Marte grounder and tagged Moreno before he could scurry back to second. Pena had enough time to fire to first before Marte arrived.
