Peña's power bat continues to boost Astros (6 straight wins)  

HOUSTON -- The biggest swing of Jeremy Peña's season was certainly one of the biggest swings of the Astros’ season to date.

Peña’s go-ahead, three-run homer in the fifth inning on Friday night ignited the Astros’ dugout and sent them on their way to a 5-4 win in the series opener against the Brewers at Minute Maid Park.

“That was a big swing, one of the biggest swings of the season for sure,” manager Joe Espada said.

In Peña’s eyes, there’s no such thing as a base hit that isn’t impactful. They all matter, but putting the Astros ahead and helping them win their season-high sixth consecutive game was as clutch as it gets for May.

“All my hits are big, man,” Peña said with a smile. “I don’t have one bad hit this whole year. It’s like every hit you get is the best one you’ve had. But that was big for us today.”

Peña’s homer off Brewers starter Freddy Peralta put the Astros ahead, 5-4, and four relief pitchers followed with one scoreless inning each to deny the Brewers. Josh Hader, the former Milwaukee closer, logged a 1-2-3 ninth for his sixth save -- giving him saves against all 30 MLB teams.

It’s early to be looking at the standings, but a Houston team that was eight games out on May 9 has trimmed that deficit in half and now trails first-place Seattle by four games in the American League West.

“I see a team who is playing with some urgency,” Espada said. “We’ve got a little bit of edge to our game, on both sides of the ball. You can see the swag, you can hear the energy. It’s time for us to pick it up and play our baseball, and we’re doing that.”

The homer off a Peralta slider was the second of Peña’s career that he’s hit while the Astros were trailing and eventually won the game. The other was a walk-off homer off Jordan Romano of the Blue Jays on April 24, 2022. Friday’s homer came on a 3-2 pitch.

“I was looking for a pitch I could handle, something up,” Peña said. “They threw me the slider and I recognized it at the end, and tried to put a good swing on it.”

Peña, coming off a breakout rookie season in 2022 that culminated with him earning the World Series Most Valuable Player Award, saw his power stroke disappear in the second half of last season. He didn’t homer after July 5 and reported to camp this spring with a new stance.

His goal was to limit his movement in the box and return to driving the ball to the outfield.

“I feel simple,” Peña said. “I feel like I can repeat my routine day in and day out. I can repeat my swing positions at the plate and just simplifying my at-bats. I think that’s the biggest change.”

None of Peña’s three batted balls on Friday were barrels, but his work to hit the ball in the air more this year has paid off:

Ground ball rate

2023: 245/450 (54.4%)
2024: 68/147 (46.3%)

Fly ball rate

2023: 85/450 (18.9%)
2024: 33/147 (22.4%)

Barrel rate

2023: 18/450 (4.0%)
2024: 6/147 (4.1%)

“It’s a huge difference,” Espada said. “Confidence. How simple his swing looks. For me, it’s more about consistency and how he’s able to repeat his stance, his swing. Just a more mature approach overall.”

Peña said he’s still not 100 percent comfortable with his new stance, though he said he’s slowly moving in the right direction. The numbers back that up. He’s third in the AL in batting average at .326 and is tied with teammate Jose Altuve for the most hits in the AL with 56.

“We’re getting there,” he said. “I still feel some tendencies from my previous self. … I feel I get jumpy at times. I try to do too much, try to get big and muscle up. I need to stay loose and stay relaxed and trust in the work we put in day in and day out.”

The work Peña put in during the offseason to revamp his swing, and the positive results that have followed, is part of the reason why the Astros have found their swagger.

“We’re feeling good,” Peña said. “We’ve always believed in ourselves since the beginning. We have a great team, we’ve got the necessary pieces and we’re slowly putting it back together.”