ANAHEIM http://www.twinsfanproshop.com/authentic-max-kepler-jersey , Calif. (AP) — Marwin Gonzalez was at his best again, homering for the eighth time this month. Justin Verlander didn’t have his best stuff, but he did just enough.Gonzalez and Verlander proved to be a winning combination as they led the Houston Astros to an 8-3 win over the Los Angeles Angels on Saturday night.Gonzalez hit a solo home run to left-center field off reliever Williams Jerez to lead off the four-run eighth inning. Gonzalez has 14 home runs this season, including eight in August. The Astros had been clinging to a one-run lead before he opened the eighth with that homer.“Marwin is a great player,” teammate Jose Altuve said. “He did it last year. He’s been doing it a long time. Sometimes, people get surprised by what he does. Not me, because I’ve seen him play this good.”The Astros (79-50) are in first place in the AL West and have won four consecutive games and five of their last six. They’re the best road team in baseball, improving to 17-5 in California. The Astros are 6-2 against the Angels this season. The Angels have lost five consecutive games.Verlander allowed three runs in six innings, but he was staked to an early 3-0 lead and the offense picked him up.“Awesome. Those guys backed me up today,” Verlander said. “Today was a battle for me physically. Didn’t feel great for whatever reason. One of those games you take pride in battling, knowing I didn’t have anywhere near my best stuff.”Altuve was hit in the elbow by a fastball from Justin Anderson in the seventh, but remained in the game. Ohtani was then hit in the backside by Roberto Osuna in the eighth and both benches were warned. Deck McGuire hit Yuli Gurriel in the leg in the ninth inning and was ejected. Angels manager Mike Scioscia was also ejected.“I would like to think the pitch was not on purpose. I’m not sure about that,” Ohtani said through an interpreter. “We hit their guy. I’m sure it wasn’t on purpose. It’s part of baseball. It happens.”McGuire said there was no intent behind his pitch, either.“I was just trying to go in … to a guy who likes to dive over the plate and I missed down the middle, and I’m just trying to make sure it didn’t happen again,” McGuire said. “It’s unfortunate in that situation that (bench) warnings had been issued because there was no intent on my part.”Verlander (13-8) had thrown 26 consecutive scoreless innings against the Angels this season before Shohei Ohtani homered against him in the fourth inning on the first pitch of the at-bat. It was Ohtani’s 14th home run of the season, eight shy of his career best in Japan in 2016.Verlander allowed six hits and struck out six and walked two. He was grooving until the fourth when Ohtani hit a two-run homer to center field. Andrelton Simmons hit a run-scoring triple off Verlander in the sixth.Ohtani was caught stealing for the first time this season. He was thrown out at third by catcher and friend Martin Maldonado, who was traded by the Angels in July. Maldonado was smiling plenty afterward.Jaime Barria (8-8) had a rough outing, lasting just three innings after he gave up four runs on five hits. It was his shortest outing since he threw just two innings in a loss against San Francisco on April 22.CHECK PLEASEOne day after showing off a million-dollar receipt for being a “Dodger killer” for his lunch from The Beverly Hills Hotel on Friday Jason Castro Jersey , Verlander revealed that his meal was comped. The hotel jokingly charged him an extra $1 million since Houston beat the Dodgers to win the World Series last year. The receipt went viral, for many things, including how expensive the items were, like the $30 pancakes, $42 chicken salad and $10 cranberry juice.“The manager came over and we ended up laughing about it,” Verlander said. “They actually ended up comping the meal. Everyone was talking about how expensive the pancakes were and the salad. It was comped. It worked out well for both sides.”TRAINER’S ROOMAstros: OF George Springer (quadriceps) is expected to get an at-bat Saturday or Sunday. A decision will be made by Monday whether he will go on the disabled list or not. He has missed five consecutive games. … INF Gonzalez (sore knee) is still in the lineup but experiencing some soreness.Angels: RHP/DH Ohtani (strained right elbow) threw a 21-pitch bullpen session on Saturday. He is scheduled to throw a simulated game next week. … LHP Tyler Skaggs (left adductor strain) played catch again Saturday. … C Rene Rivera (bee sting) was stung on his arm during Friday’s game when he threw a ball back to the mound. He stayed in the game.UP NEXTAstros: LHP Framber Valdez (1-0, 0.00 ERA) will make his first career start and second appearance. He threw 4 1/3 innings in relief in his Major League debut Tuesday, allowing one unearned run on two hits and struck out four.Angels: RHP Felix Pena (1-3, 4.53) struck out 12 in his last start but gave up four earned runs in six innings in the Angels’ 5-4 loss in Arizona on Tuesday. The Orioles were in a record-setting mood today. Unfortunately, they’re bad records to have."WhiteFanposts Fanshots Sections Commentary & AnalysisOrioles ProspectsOrioles Game RecapsOrioles News and RumorsCamdencastOrioles Game RecapsOrioles give up five more homers in 8-5 loss to AthleticsNew,40commentsThe Orioles were in a record-setting mood today. Unfortunately, they’re bad records to have.EDTShareTweetShareShareOrioles give up five more homers in 8-5 loss to AthleticsChris Davis: Still hitless.Evan Habeeb-USA TODAY SportsThere have been many historic moments in Orioles history where a lucky crowd got to see it and tens of thousands more tell fibs about having been there. Cal’s 2,131 game, the Doug DeCinces home run that launched Orioles Magic, Earl Weaver’s (first) last game, Eddie Murray hitting his 500th home run, and more. Those were good historic moments.Not all history is good for the Orioles. In Thursday afternoon’s 8-5 loss to the Athletics, Orioles fans got more of the wrong kind of history. That includes the Orioles setting a new record for consecutive games allowing a home run to begin a season at 13, and Chris Davis adding a new futile feather to his cap of records by claiming and then extending the MLB record for number of consecutive hitless plate appearances.Davis has now gone 61 plate appearances in a row with no hits. He did draw a walk today Phil Hughes Jersey , if you want to give him some credit for that, and he managed to drive a pitch to the warning track early in the game. His streak of hitless at-bats sits at 0-53, including 0-32 to begin the 2019 season. According to The Sun’s Nathan Ruiz, this sets up the next record in Davis’s sights: 0-37, the streak of hitless ABs that Eugenio Velez had in the 2011 season with the Dodgers.As bad as the ongoing Davis situation is, he is not the reason the Orioles lost Thursday’s game. The biggest culprit is surely starting pitcher Dylan Bundy.In an uncharacteristic bit of optimism, I managed to convince myself before the season that if there was any one player who would surely thrive under the new Mike Elias pro-analytics regime, it would be Bundy. In retrospect, I don’t know why I believed this, but it seemed like a sound conclusion. Perhaps that positive transformation is still to come, but it hasn’t been seen through Bundy’s first three games.Bundy famously allowed 41 home runs last season. He’s begun the 2019 season as if he’s on a mission to “beat” last year’s total, including today, when in a cool April day game in Baltimore, he managed to serve up four taters to Athletics batters. Four! It’s April 11! Imagining what will happen once the weather actually warms up leads to something too grotesque to contemplate.Early in the game, the Orioles actually led. Left fielder Dwight Smith Jr. got on the home run board with his first blast of 2019 in the first inning, a solo shot to give the O’s a 1-0 advantage early on. This looked like it might even be a big boost as Bundy cruised through the first three innings without allowing a hit, striking out five Oakland batters.In today’s baseball analysis, it’s generally accepted that the third time through the order is the time where a starting pitcher is truly in danger. Bundy decided not to wait until the third time, instead starting his meltdown just the second time through the order. After allowing a leadoff double to Marcus Semien in the fourth inning http://www.twinsfanproshop.com/authentic-max-kepler-jersey , Bundy hurled a meatball to Khris (with a K) Davis and saw that ball blasted over the fence in center field, 378 feet away. The A’s took a 2-1 lead and would never trail again.K. Davis has hit 40+ home runs each of the last three seasons, so there’s no shame in giving up a home run to him, right? While that’s true, the fifth inning two-run shot by catcher Josh Phegley (career single season HR high: 9) is a bit harder to overlook. Leading off the sixth inning, K. Davis struck again, immediately followed by Kendrys Morales, and just like that, Bundy’s game was over after five-plus innings with six runs allowed on four home runs.Commenter F. Shoes noted that K. Davis’s two home runs last night plus two home runs today gave him four home runs in less than 24 hours. C. Davis does not have four home runssince the beginning of last August.The day began for Bundy with a 7.36 ERA. That’s high enough where we can start to apply the Matusz Test, named after the disastrous 2011 season of ever-escalating ERAs by another former #4 overall pick. Bundy’s six runs in five innings raised his ERA to 8.76. Matusz Test failure. Let’s hope he starts passing the test in subsequent starts.Bundy’s exit meant that new Orioles reliever Josh Lucas came into the game. He was welcomed to Baltimore by Cedric Mullins booting a single to center field, a two-base error that immediately put a man on third base. Jurickson Profar drove in the run with a sacrifice fly to put the A’s up 7-1. It was an unearned run against Lucas, consolation for his career ERA but not so much the Orioles chances of winning the game.The O’s did manage to fight back. In a four-run seventh inning, the O’s loaded the bases with no one out thanks to two walks and a single. The first two batters reaching chased A’s starter Aaron Brooks. After loading the bases by walking Davis, reliever J.B. Wendelken lost control of a curveball and hit Pedro Severino in the head with a pitch to score a run. The bases were still loaded with none out.A wild pitch scored one run and moved up the runners, allowing a Mullins groundout to score another run. Smith added a double to plate the last of the earlier bases loaded runners, Severino, with the O’s having clawed the deficit back to 7-5. With two out, the tying run was at the plate. Jonathan Villar lined out to end the rally.Just for fun, and possibly to lead to more records http://www.twinsfanproshop.com/authentic-max-kepler-jersey , Mychal Givens gave up a solo homer in the ninth inning to Semien, the fifth homer the O’s allowed in Thursday’s game. That gives them 38 home runs allowed in their first 13 games. It almost seems unreal.Fresh call-up Tanner Scott also pitched in the game. His appearance made him the 20th pitcher the O’s have used this year. As Camden Chat commenter tflach2 noted, the division-winning 2014 Orioles used 20 pitchers for their whole season. Scott could not even complete an inning today, giving up two hits in three batters.These Orioles were always supposed to lose a lot of games. It took a week into the season for us to start to see why, but now it’s on full display daily. It’s like even the MASN broadcasts can’t pretend any of this matters. The announcers keep chowing down on promotional food while game action is occurring, then talking while chewing to say how good it is. Today they were served, and ate on air, gyros. Please, MASN, stop making, or letting, them eat on air. I’m embarrassed for you and a little disgusted by you.The O’s are now 5-8. They’ve lost seven of the last eight games. The good news, such as it is, is that they’re heading to Boston for four games, where they’ll face the last place Red Sox. The bad news is that after getting to play these Orioles four times, the Red Sox might not be in last any more. David Hess and Eduardo Rodriguez are the scheduled starters for the 7:10pm Friday opener.