Whit Merrifield, Hunter Dozier and Emmanuel Rivera all homered as the Kansas City Royals roughed up Cristian Javier early and held on for a 7-4 win over the Houston Astros on Wednesday night.

Javier (6-4) had allowed one hit in 14 innings over his last two starts, which included seven innings of a combined no-hitter against the Yankees on June 25. He struck out 27 in those two appearances, both wins. But the Royals got to him almost immediately.

Merrifield sent Javier’s third pitch into the seats in left field for his fourth homer this season. Javier walked Andrew Benintendi before Dozier’s two-out shot to the Crawford Boxes in left field made it 3-0. Rivera homered to left-center in the second.

Brad Keller (4-9) allowed five hits and four runs in 5 2/3 innings, and the Royals’ bullpen shut the Astros down the rest of the way to snap Houston’s major league-best eight-game winning streak. Scott Barlow allowed one hit in a scoreless ninth for his 13th save.

Kansas City was clinging to a one-run lead entering the ninth inning before Nicky Lopez hit a ground-rule double with one out and scored on a two-out double by Benintendi. MJ Melendez followed with an RBI single that pushed the lead to 7-4.

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Houston’s Justin Verlander (10-3, 2.03 ERA), whose 10 wins are tied for the major league lead, opposes Kris Bubic (1-5, 7.06) when the series wraps up Thursday. Pregame begins at 12:30, with game time at 1:10. You can hear the broadcast from the Royals’ Radio Network on KMMO AM 1300.