HOUSTON (Interstat) — Yordan Alvarez hit his 40th home run and Jeremy Peña also went deep as the Houston Astros defeated the Kansas City Royals 6-2 on Thursday, Sept. 17, 2026, at Daikin Park. Houston hit a season-high five solo homers. Bryan King earned the win with 1 1/3 perfect innings of relief and one strikeout. Ethan Pecko allowed one earned run on three hits with four strikeouts over 5 2/3 innings. Seth Lugo took the loss after yielding four earned runs on eight hits with five strikeouts in five innings. Peña finished 2-for-5 with a homer and two RBIs. LaMonte Wade Jr. and Alvarez each went 2-for-4 with a homer and an RBI. Taylor Trammell also homered. Kansas City managed three hits. Houston improved to 77-76 and moved one game ahead of Texas in the AL West. Kansas City fell to 67-86. Attendance was 34,853. The game took 2 hours, 24 minutes.