Yankees can't finish sweep of Astros, but close out successful homestand | Takeaways

NEW YORK – The Yankees on Thursday wrapped up a successful homestand, but one loss kept it from being a perfect one.

A rough start by Marcus Stroman sunk the Yankees on Thursday as the Astros won the series finale, 4-3, before a crowd of 38,095 at Yankee Stadium.

Gleyber Torres singled off Astros closer Josh Hader to start the bottom of the ninth, but the Yankees couldn’t drive him in.

But the Yankees still won the series and won five of six games on this homestand.

The Yankees’ scoring on Thursday all came via home runs.

Anthony Volpe hit a two-run blast off Astros starter Ronel Blanco in the third inning, while Aaron Judge demolished a changeup from Ryan Pressly 473 feet to left-center field in the eighth.

"It was an impressive homestand for a lot of guys," Judge said. "Starting pitching to relievers doing their thing as they always do, and the guys in the lineup swinging the bat well."

The Yankees on Friday begin a six-game, seven-day road trip starting with a three-game set against the Tampa Bay Rays before three games at Minnesota.

"We know obviously what Tampa's capable of," manager Aaron Boone said. "It seems like they're starting to settle in and getting some guys back in their lineup."

Marcus Stroman mostly settles in after rough start

Nothing about Stroman’s outing came easily, especially in the early innings.

With two outs in the top of the first, Stroman hung a cutter over the plate that Yordan Alvarez smacked to the second deck in right field.

Stroman, pitching on five days’ rest, then walked Jeremy Pena before giving up another long, hard-hit home run to the third deck in right to Jon Singleton that put the Astros up 3-0.

"Definitely a lot of adversity in there," Stroman said. "I just think I wasn't good enough early on, just put our team in a little bit of a hole. Just got to be better. Can't give up three in the first. Just feel like I don't give my team a chance when I do that."

Stroman’s outing stayed laborious.

He gave up a lead-off double to Yainer Diaz in the second and Joey Liperfido reached on an infield single. Two batters later, Jose Altuve singled to load the bases with one out.

But Stroman escaped further trouble, striking out Kyle Tucker and getting Alvarez to fly out to left field.

"He doesn’t give in," Boone said. "He continues to trust that he’s going to keep making pitches. I thought stuff-wise and everything, he did that today."

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Stroman allowed another run in the fifth – Alvarez doubled with one out and scored on a single by Pena, but couldn’t get through the sixth.

He got Diaz to ground into a double play, but walked Loperfido, which brought Boone out of the dugout to bring in Luke Weaver.

Still, the fact Stroman even made it through 5.2 innings was important for the Yankees considering the way things began.

"I had a little mechanical adjustment where I felt a little better," Stroman said. "Just been kind of playing with a few things. Just didn't execute on some of those pitches. They capitalized on two pitches that didn't end up doing what I wanted them to do. That's baseball."

The four earned runs Stroman allowed matched his season high – he gave up that many in two of his previous seven starts.

Stroman on Thursday yielded nine hits. He walked two and struck out five.

Yankees still controlled season series against Astros

Despite Thursday’s loss, the Yankees still inflicted plenty of damage against Houston this season (the teams don’t play each other again the rest of the regular season), sweeping the Astros in a four-game series to start the season before taking two of three this week at the Stadium.

Their seasons are still going in very different directions.

While the Yankees sit 11 games over .500, the Astros sit 11 games below .500.

Entering Thursday, the Yanks had won nine straight games against Houston going back to last season, their longest winning streak against the Astros in franchise history.

This article originally appeared on NorthJersey.com: Yankees can't finish sweep of Astros to close out homestand