Two Big Astros Innings Undo Rangers

On Thursday, by the time Dunning walked off the mound with the bases loaded in the fourth, the pair combined for 3 1/3 innings, seven hits, six earned runs, four walks and four strikeouts. Dunning had all of the strikeouts.

Each had an inning that proved to be their undoing.

Heaney started the game, and no pitcher in baseball started more times against the Astros this season than the veteran. In four starts, he was 1-0 with a 2.75 ERA. The Rangers were 2-2 in those games and he never allowed more than three runs.

He gave up three runs on Thursday. The difference this time is that he was unable to get out of the first inning.

He gave up four straight hits to start the game — Jose Altuve double, a Mauricio Dubón, Alex Bregman two-run and Yordan Alvarez RBI single — to give the Astros a 3-0 lead. Heaney retired the next two hitters, but after walking Chas McCormick, Rangers manager Bruce Bochy gave him a quick hook after just 22 pitches.

Heaney said he made too many mistakes over the plate, but didn’t notice any change in his velocity.

“I ended up throwing a lot of balls down the middle and that’s not a recipe for success against them,” Heaney said.

Dunning managed to get out of the inning without further damage. He worked around an Altuve hit and a Bregman walk in the second to keep the Astros from getting further ahead, and he retired the side in the third. By then, the Rangers had tied the game.

Dunning said he felt he was attacking the zone effectively and making good pitches in the second and third innings.

But the fourth inning was Dunning’s undoing and, in retrospect, the inflection point for the rest of the game.

“Our offense was able to rally back and was able to tie it up, and I needed a shutdown inning,” Dunning said.

Dunning started the fourth by walking Martín Maldonado, who has batted below .200 in each of the past three seasons. Then he walked Altuve and gave up a single to Dubón to load the bases with no outs. Bochy had Cody Bradford warming up in the bullpen, anticipating a lefty-on-lefty matchup with Alvarez.

Dunning had to get Bregman out first, and he struck out the third baseman. But he left Bradford a mess to clean up.

He gave up a deep sacrifice fly to Alvarez, which scored Altuve. But that felt like a win if Bradford could get José Abreu out.

He could not. Abreu took Bradford’s first pitch for a 438-foot ride to break the game open and give the Astros a 7-3 lead.

“I put Cody in a bad spot,” Dunning said. “We had a chance to get out of it, but he never should have been in that situation.”

Thursday’s decision to work Heaney and Dunning as a tandem wasn’t so much a risk as it was the best of limited options. The Rangers have their starters set up for the next two games — Jordan Montgomery in Game 5 and Nathan Eovaldi in Game 6. The Eovaldi start isn’t official yet. Both would be able to pitch on normal rest.

The rest of the starting options — Bradford, Jon Gray and Martín Pérez — all pitched in relief either in Game 3 or Game 4, or in the case of Bradford and Pérez, both. Gray hadn’t pitched in three weeks before his relief stint on Wednesday and isn’t properly stretched out. Pérez hasn’t started since he was moved to the bullpen in early August.

This was what the Rangers had for Game 4. It just wasn’t nearly enough against an Astros lineup that seems to treat road game at Globe Life Field like its batting practice.

“That’s the Astros to a T — they capitalize when you make mistakes,” Dunning said.