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Houston’s Ronel Blanco, with one hit already this year, retired after seven hitless innings.

Gillberg
Houston’s Ronel Blanco, with one hit already this year, retired after seven hitless innings.

HOUSTON — Ronel Blanco had the second no-hit outing of his brief major league career, but was removed after seven innings as the Houston Astros beat the Detroit Tigers, 4-1, on Sunday.

Manager Joe Espada shared part of the conversation he had with Blanco when he removed the dominant right-hander from the game.

“I just told him how proud I am of what he’s doing,” Espada said. “He’s a guy who came out of nowhere and he continues to perform at a high level. He’s really got his team back through the injuries and he’s going out there and doing the things we need him to do.

Blanco (7-2), who threw the only no-hitter in the majors this season on April 1 against Toronto, was just as good this time in the 20th start and 37th appearance of his career. The 30-year-old threw 94 pitches with 65 strikes and tied a season high with eight strikeouts. He walked three.

“I was just attacking the strike zone,” he said through an interpreter.

Ryan Pressly replaced Blanco to start the eighth and gave up the Tigers’ first hit, a two-out single by Wenceel Pérez.

Jose Altuve hit a three-run homer for Houston.

Blanco is the second pitcher in franchise history to have two starts with at least seven hitless innings in the same season, joining Framber Valdez, who did so last year.

The Tigers couldn’t do much against Blanco a day after he had a game-high 19 hits in a 13-5 win over the Astros. Blanco didn’t allow a baserunner until he walked Gio Urshela with two outs in the fifth. He then walked Akil Baddoo and Carson Kelly to load the bases, but retired Zach McKinstry on a flyout.

Espada said it wasn’t a difficult decision to replace Blanco because of the number of pitches he threw this year, noting that he had four outings with more than 100 pitches and two with 98.

“But did I want him to be more effective sooner and give him a chance? One hundred percent,” Espada said.

Blanco said he wasn’t upset when Espada eliminated him.

“I threw a lot of pitches and I wasn’t going to be able to finish them,” he said. “So, I just accepted it.”

Blanco made a good defensive play for the second out of the sixth when he caught a comebacker hit by Matt Vierling. He then sat Riley Greene on a pop-up.

Urshela had two outs in the seventh following a throwing error by third baseman Alex Bregman. Blanco then struck out Baddoo on a fly ball that center fielder Jake Meyers caught on the warning track.

“We fought,” Tigers manager AJ Hinch said. “We obviously couldn’t throw anything at him. All three walks, you have a chance with two outs, but he gets through it. And then he just kept hitting runs and throwing a lot of different pitches.

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