Clemens Gets Support From Astros

Roger Clemens finally got some run support and won for the first time in his latest comeback.

“All in all, it was a good game,” Clemens said. “The guys hit the ball, and that was a lot of fun to see.”

The seven-time Cy Young Award winner gave up two runs and four hits and struck out five in five innings Monday night at Houston, leading the Astros to a 7-2 win over the Chicago Cubs.

Clemens, 43, earned his 342nd victory, his first since beating the Cubs, 3-1, in the next-to-last game of the 2005 regular season.

Lance Berkman homered twice, Preston Wilson had a run-scoring double and the Astros scored more than three runs for only the 13th time in Clemens’ 35 starts since the beginning of last season.

The Astros still can’t pinpoint why they struggle to score when Clemens pitches.

“It’s not like we’re trying to get shut out,” Berkman said. “I guarantee you, if you take a poll of all the players in here, we don’t care who’s on the mound. We want to score runs every night.”

Clemens (1-2) was hardly perfect -- he walked three, threw a wild pitch and gave up a home run to Jacque Jones -- but he still gave up two runs or fewer for the 19th time in his last 23 starts. He left after throwing 115 pitches.

Craig Biggio got the Astros started by driving the first pitch from rookie Carlos Marmol (1-3) into the seats in left field. It was Biggio’s 48th leadoff homer, second to Rickey Henderson’s 80. Berkman hit a solo homer in the first.

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San Francisco 9, Colorado 6 -- Randy Winn drove in the go-ahead run with a broken-bat double, and the Giants rallied for three runs in the eighth inning at Denver to give Manager Felipe Alou his 1,000th win.

The Giants leapfrogged Colorado into second place in the National League West, half a game behind San Diego, which did not play.

Alou is sixth among San Francisco managers with 309 wins. Dusty Baker had 840 wins for San Francisco from 1993 to 2002. Alou is eighth in victories among active managers.

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Washington 9, Florida 1 -- Alfonso Soriano homered twice and drove in four runs and Pedro Astacio (1-0), who sat out the first three months of the season because of right forearm strain, won his debut with the host Nationals.

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Pittsburgh 11, New York 1 -- All-Star Jason Bay drove in three runs and Paul Maholm (3-7) held the slumping Mets in check for six innings at New York.

Bay hit a two-run double in Pittsburgh’s five-run seventh, and Ronny Paulino and Nate McLouth hit consecutive home runs to start the eighth.

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Atlanta 6, St. Louis 3 -- John Smoltz (5-5) won for the first time in eight starts and the Braves hit four home runs at Atlanta.

The Braves have won two games in a row for the first time since May 27-28, a span of 33 games. The Cardinals have lost 11 of 13 and seven in a row on the road.

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Milwaukee 8, Cincinnati 7 -- Bill Hall homered and had four hits and Carlos Lee drove in the winning run with a single in the ninth inning for the Brewers’ 22nd comeback victory in 26 home wins.

Ken Griffey Jr. hit his 554th homer and hit a double in the ninth that put Cincinnati ahead, 7-6.

But Matt Wise (5-4) retired Austin Kearns with the bases loaded to end the inning.