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Oswalt pitches Astros past Cubs

Sep 2, 2008 - 12:08 AM CHICAGO (Ticker) -- For the first four months of the season, Roy Oswalt was a .500 pitcher. The momentum the Houston Astros ace built in August clearly carried over to his first start in September.

Oswalt pitched 8 1/3 spectacular innings, winning for the fifth time in his last six starts as the Astros captured a 3-0 victory over the Chicago Cubs on Monday.

The righthander allowed just four hits and did not walk a batter, striking out three. Oswalt (13-9) has posted a 1.59 ERA in his last six starts and came two outs away from his second complete game in his last three starts.

"A terrific outing by Roy," Astros manager Cecil Cooper said. "He used his fastball primarily but he threw some breaking balls and used his changeup a bit. The key was Roy just hitting his spots."

He also went the distance in a 3-0 loss to the New York Mets on August 22.

"My slider felt great and my fastball came out of my hand real good," Oswalt said. "That is the big key because it allowed me to spot my fastball down out of the zone. That got us quick outs."

The Astros staked Oswalt to a lead with a pair of runs in the fourth inning. Miguel Tejada led off the frame with a triple off Cubs starter Jason Marquis and after Lance Berkman walked, Geoff Blum drove in Tejada with a sacrifice fly. Berkman, who advanced to second the play, stole third and scored on an RBI single by Hunter Pence.

Houston (72-66) is 25-10 in its last 35 games, but still sits 8 1/2 games behind the Milwaukee Brewers (80-57) in the National League wild-card race.

"We have to continue to grind as a team right now and try to progress," Pence said.

Marquis (9-8) struck out a season-high eight in six innings but allowed two runs, five hits and three walks to suffer the loss.

"He gave up two runs, if (Jim) Edmonds' throw is on line to the plate and we get Tejada, he might get out of the inning with nothing," Cubs manager Lou Piniella said.

"I feel good with how I am throwing the ball," Marquis said. "I have worked hard on trying to be more consistent. Today was a good day for me but not for the team."

Houston added an insurance run in the eighth off Chicago reliever Jeff Samardzija. Tejada led off with a single and moved to third on Berkman's second single of the day. Samardzija followed with a wild pitch, scoring Tejada from third and pushing the Astros lead to 3-0.

Oswalt allowed leadoff singles to rookie Geovany Soto in the third and Ryan Theriot in the sixth. He left the game after consecutive one-out singles by Daryl Ward and Alfonso Soriano in the ninth, but Jose Valverde recorded the final two outs in the ninth for his 38th save of the season.

The Cubs have lost three consecutive games for the first time since June 26-29, when they dropped a season-high four straight.

"This guy (Oswalt) is a good pitcher and Phillies threw some good pitchers at us too," Piniella said. "These are guys we are going to have to hit, but today we didn't so we need (Carlos) Zambrano to give us a good ball game tomorrow and get us back on track."