Carlos Lee homered twice and Bud Norris turned in one of his best starts of the season to lead the Houston Astros to an 8-1 victory over the Chicago Cubs on Wednesday afternoon.
Hunter Pence added an RBI and Lance Berkman drew three walks and scored a run for the Astros, who have taken four of six from the Cubs in the last nine days.
Randy Wells (5-8) entered Wednesday’s contest riding a 14-inning scoreless streak and breezed through the first five frames, allowing one hit. But Berkman drew a walk leading off the sixth in front of Pence, who knotted the contest at 1-1 and ended Wells’ streak with an RBI double.
Lee came up after Pence and took a strike before turning on the 0-1 pitch and driving it over the wall in left to put Houston on top, 3-1. Lee added another two-run shot in the seventh - his 14th blast of the season - and the Astros piled on three more in the eighth to put the game away.
Norris (3-7) yielded an unearned run on four hits while walking three and striking out seven in six innings to pick up his first win since May 13. The right-hander came into Wednesday’s start having allowed at least four runs in each of his last three outings.
Chi. Cubs | Houston | |
Randy Wells | Player | Bud Norris |
Loss | W/L | Win |
5.2 | IP | 6.0 |
4 | Strikeouts | 7 |
5 | Hits | 4 |
4.76 | ERA | 0.00 |
Chi. Cubs | Houston | |
Ryan Theriot | Player | Hunter Pence |
3 | Hits | 3 |
0 | RBI | 2 |
0 | HR | 0 |
3 | TB | 4 |
.600 | Avg | .600 |