Indians Get 8-6 Win Against Astros Thanks to Flurry of Home Runs; three takeaways

CLEVELAND-- The Cleveland Indians entered Saturday night's game against the Houston Astros at one game under the .500 mark, and they left Progressive Field with

CLEVELAND-- The Cleveland Indians entered Saturday night's game against the Houston Astros at one game under the .500 mark, and they left Progressive Field with an even record of 25-25.

Through the first 50 games of the season the Indians managed to play average baseball, luckily for them it has been enough to hold onto the AL Central lead.

Fans didn’t have to wait until the games finale to see some fireworks, as the offense was able to lead the Tribe to an 8-6 victory, and got three home runs off of Houston’s starter Lance McCullers. Indians starter Carlos Carrasco had his hands full from the first pitch as Houston challenged in every at bat.

The Indians have an opportunity to split the four game weekend series tomorrow afternoon when Trevor Bauer takes the hill. Here are three takeaways from Saturday night's win.

1. Smooth Insurance

Michael Brantley has been the epitome of consistency in the Indians lineup over the years, and this season that has been no different.

Brantley is currently hitting well over .300 and is in the middle of a 15-game hitting streak. Brantley came into Saturday night sporting seven home runs on the season, but home run number eight may be slightly more important than others as it served as an insurance run in the seventh inning.

The Astros had scored in three straight innings, and were able to cut the once four run deficit to just one run. With the struggles of the bullpen, insurance runs are always huge, especially since the high powered Houston offense.

2. Making things difficult

The Houston Astros are the defending World Champions for a number of reasons, one of the most important being their ability to light up the scoreboard.

Indians fans experienced this on Friday night when the Astros exploded for 11 runs in just two innings, this after Corey Kluber pitched a good game in six and one-third innings allowing zero runs. So keeping this offense off the scoreboard is difficult even for a good pitcher such as Carlos Carrasco, but Saturday night he pitched well enough to give the Tribe a chance.

Houston hitters were consistently taking Carrasco deep into counts and making him pay once he had two outs. The Astros lineup hit two homers, one double, drew two walks and put up five runs off the Indians starter in five and two-thirds innings, but he still came away with the victory.

3. Rainy day. Beautiful night

This one got underway an hour after the original first pitch time, but that didn’t scare away of the crowd. In fact the 30,639 in attendance made Saturday one of the higher attended games in the season, and luckily for them they got to see a win.

The attendance issue is something the organization has dealt with for years, and frankly until they win a World Series it is something they will always deal with. Every season there seems to be a new excuse as to why fans stay away from the ballpark. Regardless of the reason, winning when fans show up goes a long way in getting them to return at a later date.