It has been a different story though in the three postseason games. The group hasn’t allowed a run in 14 2/3 innings, limiting opponents to 3 for 43. Against Oakland, four pitchers allowed no hits and a walk, an impressive start in a best-of-five series without any days off.

Blake Taylor and Enoli Paredes made their postseason debuts Monday, combining to retire every batter they faced in three innings.

Baker was hoping to get at least five innings from starter Lance McCullers Jr., but the right-hander was pulled after Marcus Semien’s single to lead off the fifth. Taylor came on and retired the next three hitters. Semien scored on a sacrifice fly by Mark Canha but Oakland didn’t get a runner even get to second base the rest of the day.

“We really didn’t want to go to the bullpen that early if we could help it. Some of these guys aren’t used to going back to back days,” Baker said. “They used a lot of their bullpen but ours came in and did a great job.”

Paredes retired the side in the sixth and seventh innings with two strikeouts while Cristian Javier had a walk and two strikeouts in the eighth.

Ryan Pressly, who is the most experienced of Houston’s bullpen crew, retired the side in the ninth and struck out Sean Murphy to end the game.

“They came in and didn’t give us any freebees. We didn’t get the hits we needed,” Murphy said.