Pham, Gyorko power Cards to third straight win

HOUSTON -- Tommy Pham and Jedd Gyorko each homered to help the St. Louis Cardinals beat the Houston Astros 8-5 on Tuesday night.

The Cardinals roughed up ace Dallas Keuchel (7-12) to overcome a rocky outing from starter Jaime Garcia (10-8). Garcia gave up five runs and seven hits in five innings, including three home runs.

The Astros dropped their third in a row, and the Cardinals won their third straight on the day they learned outfielder Matt Holliday and reliever Seth Maness are headed for the disabled list. Holliday will have surgery on his right thumb and could miss the remainder of the regular season, while Maness will have Tommy John surgery, likely sidelining him until 2018.

Seung Hwan Oh pitched a scoreless ninth, striking out three, for his 12th save.

Keuchel had his second rough start in the last two weeks. The reigning AL Cy Young Award winner allowed six runs and six hits over five innings Tuesday after allowing seven runs in five innings in Detroit on July 31, matching his season high for runs allowed.

The Cardinals' Jedd Gyorko (3) is greeted at home plate after hitting a three-run home run off the Astros during the sixth inning Tuesday in Houston. The Cardinals won 8-5.

Houston's Alex Bregman hit his first major league home run in the first in his 78th career at-bat. Houston erased a 2-0 first-inning deficit with Bregman's homer, a solo homer from Marwin Gonzalez and an RBI single from Jose Altuve.

The Cardinals evened the score 4-4 in the fifth with Pham's two-run homer and later extended the lead to 8-4 when Gyorko homered off reliever Pat Neshek for his 18th of the season.

Yadier Molina added two RBIs for St. Louis despite going 0 for 4.

Jason Castro had a solo home run for Houston in the sixth.

Altuve singled in the ninth for his 1,000th career hit, becoming the fastest player in franchise history to reach the milestone, doing it in 786 games. Cesar Cedeno previously held the record, reaching 1,000 hits in 889 games, one game faster than Jeff Bagwell.

Training room

Cardinals: Holliday will have surgery today on his right thumb. Holliday was hit by a pitch against the Cubs last Thursday and could be sidelined through September.

The Cardinals recalled right-hander Sam Tuivailala from Class AAA Memphis.

Up next

Cardinals: Carlos Martinez (10-7, 3.34) will try to get his first win in four starts. He has a 7.36 ERA across his first two August starts after entering the month with a 2.99 ERA on the season.

Astros: Doug Fister (11-7, 3.61) looks to replicate earlier success against St. Louis. He allowed five hits and two runs in 7 1/3 innings against the Cardinals on June 14, earning the win.

He also won his last start against Minnesota despite allowing five runs and eight hits in seven innings.