Making his first start for the Astros since April 5th, the Astros were excited to get starter Spencer Arrighetti back on the mound, but it didn’t go as planned, dropping the final game of the series to the Marlins 6-4.

After playing from behind since the bottom of the first, Houston had a chance to put themselves ahead but failed.

After a pitch-hit walk to Jeremy Peña loaded the bases with one-out, a Cam Smith chopper to third resulted in the runner being forced out at home and a flare shot to the second baseman from Dubón ended the inning and stranded the bases loaded with Houston down two.

The Astros did get on the board first though, and fast.

After a one-out double from Jesús Sánchez gave the Astros the first hit of the game, he was brought home with a massive, two-out blast from Christian Walker, putting Houston up 2-0 right away.

That lead didn’t hold up though once Arrighetti stepped on the mound for the first time since the beginning of April. Six hits in the first inning, all singles, gave the Marlins the lead right back, plating three.

This was followed by runs in the second and third off Arrighetti, adding two more runs to the Miami lead, going up 5-2.

Luckily for Houston, he was done after getting pulled with two-outs in the fourth and a man on second. Astros manager Joe Espada handed the ball off to reliever Héctor Neris as the first arm out of the pen and, after walking the first two batters he faced and loading the bases, he finished the inning with a strikeout.

Spencer Arrighetti’s final line:

3.2 IP, 11 H, 5 ER, 1 BB, 5 K, 86-56 TP-S

The Astros did get a run back in the next inning with back-to-back doubles from Mauricio Dubón and Carlos Correa, but Miami answered right back with a solo-shot of their own, keeping their lead at three.

Neris saw just three batters after allowing the homer, walking one of them, before he was replaced by the next pitcher for Houston, Bennett Sousa, who finished off the fifth. And this is when the Astros started marching back.

After a leadoff groundout, three-straight hits from Astros hitters, including an RBI-double for Victor Caritini, brought the Astros back within two again.

It was also at this point in the game that an argument between the Astros dugout and the first base umpire led to an ejection of Astros pitching coach Josh Miller.

Following Sousa’s 1.1 innings of no-hit work, Espada went back into his pen again and called on Brian King and Kaleb Ort, who each gave the Astros another clean inning, allowing just one hit each.

After leading the bases loaded the inning before, the Astros came out and had one last shot to come back, but couldn’t get anything going, losing the final game of the series 6-4.

Despite the loss today, the Astros tallied 12 hits today, making that their third-straight game with 10+ hits and their fourth time in the past five games. This is a big change of pace from the Houston team we saw in Boston fresh off the deadline, who averaged under two runs a game in that series.

One of the new faces, Jesús Sánchez, had himself a good series back in his home stadium. His double in the first gave him his third double in as many games, collecting one in each of their games there.

Houston will have a day off as they head to New York to kick off a series against the ice-cold Yankees, with that series kicking off on Friday at 6:05 P.M.