HOUSTON -- The top of the 12th inning Tuesday night was undoubtedly one of the Astros’ most frustrating series of events of the season. Three consecutive A’s batters bunted with runners on base and forced the Astros to make some plays.

They didn’t, and the plucky A’s beat the Astros, 4-3, in 12 innings at Minute Maid Park in the longest Astros game of the season in terms of innings and perhaps even frustration level. Houston got an RBI double from Jose Altuve in the bottom of the inning, but they couldn’t score him.

Oakland, meanwhile, scored twice in the 12th without hitting the ball out of the infield.

“That’s kind of their style,” Astros manager Joe Espada said. “They like the safety [squeezes], and bunting guys over and stuff like that. We didn’t do a good job handling the ball there in that inning.”

The loss dropped the Astros to 77-67 with 18 games remaining in the regular season, but they remained 4 1/2 games ahead of the second-place Mariners atop the American League West. Seattle lost to the Padres.

Here are three other key developments from Tuesday’s game:

Abreu dazzles
Astros reliever Bryan Abreu, who pitched in his AL-leading 71st game of the season, was spectacular. He retired all six batters he faced in the 10th and 11th innings, including five by strikeout. The only non-strikeout came on a sacrifice bunt -- of course -- by Jacob Wilson to start the 10th.

“It helps when he’s rested, and it makes my decision a little bit easier when he has some time off,” Espada said. “You could see 99, 100 [mph]. He really wanted those punchouts. We needed punchies, and he got them. That stuff was electric.”

Abreu certainly looked like he benefited from two days off by hitting 100.4 mph. His average slider velo (88.2 mph) and fastball velo (99.1 mph) were both two-plus mph better than his season averages. It was his longest outing since Sept. 7, 2022.

“I had to come in and give it everything that I got,” Abreu said. “I felt the delivery was really smooth and I was just throwing the ball through the plate.”

Arrighetti bounces back
After allowing nine runs (three earned) on five hits and three walks in two-thirds of an inning Wednesday in Cincinnati in perhaps the worst of his previous 25 Major League starts, rookie right-hander Spencer Arrighetti rebounded nicely Tuesday with 6 2/3 innings of two-run ball.

“It’s always encouraging when the work in between starts shows up in the results,” he said. “Obviously, I tried to go out there and give the team a chance. I did the same in Cincy, and it didn’t go our way. Baseball’s a funny game. That’s kind of how it goes.”

Arrighetti allowed seven hits with one walk and had seven strikeouts, giving him 158 for the season (fifth-most by an Astros rookie). He relied heavily on his curveball -- he threw it 30 times out of his 97 pitches -- and got six of his 12 swings and misses on it.

“He threw the ball really well,” Espada said. “I thought his command was better. All his pitches were really good. You saw the life on all his pitches, and his execution was a lot better. He gave us quality innings and gave us a chance to win.”

In search of big hits
The biggest stat line that jumped out from Tuesday’s loss was the Astros going 2-for-17 with runners in scoring position. More than half of those at-bats came in extra innings.

“We hung in there,” Espada said. “At the beginning of the game, we weren’t having some quality at-bats against [Oakland starter JP] Sears, but then we started getting into the game. We got some big at-bats there and scored a couple of runs, just to get back in the game. I thought that we kind of chased a bit with men in scoring position. We expanded and tried to do a little too much. We battled to the end. We got the right guys at the plate when we wanted to, It was just one of those games.”

Both hits with runners in scoring position were by Altuve, who went 3-for-5 with his 15th three-plus-hit game of the season. He had a bloop single in the seventh to score Jason Heyward and an RBI double in the 12th, also to score Heyward.