SEATTLE — A terribly inefficient outing from young starter Vince Velasquez didn’t lead to a sweep Sunday, when the Astros bullpen shut down the Mariners and helped salvage the finale of the three-game series, 6-2.
The third start of the 23-year-old Velasquez’s career was his shortest, although not his worst, on a beautiful but slow-moving day at Safeco Field. He allowed just one run and two hits. The problem was the number of pitches (and pitches out of the zone) he needed to go 31⁄3 innings: 93, 57 of them for strikes.