Yanks back CC, turn away Astros for series win

HOUSTON — CC Sabathia won for the first time in more than a month by holding the Astros to two runs — on solo homers by Marwin Gonzalez and Evan Gattis — in 6 2/3 innings to lead the Yankees to their eighth win in 10 games, 6-3, on Tuesday night at Minute Maid Park.

“I’ve been doing everything I can and trying not to get frustrated,” Sabathia said. “We’ve been playing pretty well. We’re fighting right now, so to be able to help us get a win feels good.”

The Yankees roughed up Astros starter Doug Fister (10-7) for six runs and nine hits in 4 2/3 innings. Didi Gregorius had a sac fly and Chase Headley had an RBI single in the second to put the Yankees ahead, 2-1. Starlin Castro added an RBI single in the third, and Yankees scored three times in the fifth, capped by a two-run triple by Aaron Hicks, to take a 6-1 lead.

“I think we’re playing the way that we hoped would play,” Headley said. “We’re playing the way we know that we can. We’ve dug ourselves a hole, so we just have to keep fighting.”

Sabathia (6-8) allowed just four hits in 6 2/3 innings to win for the first time since June 16 at Minnesota. Gattis’ homer in the seventh and Gonzalez’s second homer of the game in the eighth cut the lead to 6-3 before Dellin Betances struck out Jason Castro looking to end the eighth and strand the bases loaded.

“We didn’t have good at-bats early,” Astros manager A.J. Hinch said. “[Sabathia] was really tough on us. We go into the game really wanting to piece together some hits in order to beat him. He did a better job tonight than he had done keeping the ball in the ballpark — we got a couple of home runs off of him — but we never pieced anything together. I don’t think we had back-to-back guys get on base until the very end of his outing, if at all.”

MOMENTS THAT MATTEREDCC gets back to form: It looked like a long night might be ahead when Sabathia served up a home run to the second batter he faced, but the left-hander settled in to pitch into the seventh inning and snap a winless streak that dated to June 16. Sabathia said that his two-seamer was key; he had three 1-2-3 innings in the outing, reversing his results after having permitted 29 earned runs over his previous six starts. More …

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