Correa homers in first AB after missing 4 games

OAKLAND -- Carlos Correa announced his return to the lineup with a long homer in the second inning on Tuesday night on the first pitch he saw from A's starter Daniel Mengden. That kick-started the Astros en route to a 6-3 win over the A's -- their sixth in a row.
Correa, who missed the Astros' four-game sweep of the Rangers in Arlington with right side discomfort, went 2-for-4 with two runs scored in his first game action since leaving Wednesday's game against the Mariners in Houston following a seventh-inning at-bat.
Correa's homer -- his 11th of the season -- was 108.9 mph off the bat, according to Statcast™, and traveled 410 feet into the second deck in left field.
"I wanted to get it out of the way right away," Correa said of swinging at the first pitch. "I was waiting for a fastball over the middle and I got it and didn't miss it. It was a great game."

The Astros put Correa through a pretty extensive defensive workout on Sunday in Arlington. He took Monday off before coming out early to hit and take some grounders on Tuesday.
"He's had no issues," Astros manager AJ Hinch said. "I think he could have played over the weekend, maybe on Sunday. With the off-day, we gave him an extra couple of days to be sure. He was hitting the ball all over the place, swinging as hard as I've seen him swing, and recovered fine."

Correa made his first error of the season in the eighth inning when he couldn't corral a grounder off the bat of Oakland slugger Khris Davis. He went 70 games without an error, which is a franchise record for a shortstop.
"It's not how I imagined my first error to be, ranging to the side and full extension," he said. "I didn't image a ground ball would be my first error. The scorer's decision was an error and I own it. I know I make that play nine out of 10. It's a tough error right there."
Odds and ends
• Hinch said Rich Dauer, who served as the team's first-base coach the previous three seasons, would be in uniform as a coach during next month's All-Star Game in Washington. Hinch, who is managing the AL, will take his entire coaching staff along with Dauer, who retired following last season's World Series championship. Dauer, 65, nearly died before undergoing a successful surgery to repair an acute subdural hematoma, only hours after he collapsed during the team's World Series parade on Nov. 3.
• Hinch said relief pitcher Joe Smith, who was put on the disabled list last week with right elbow soreness, visited "a couple of different doctors" on Monday in Houston. He said the early diagnosis is the injury isn't significant, but it will take him some time to get down the inflammation in his elbow. He won't throw for a few days, he said.