Yordan Alvarez seldom hits early on the field before games, preferring to take swings in the indoor cage. Houston Astros hitting coaches agree the slugger's typical volume of pre-game swings is relatively limited.

"But the swings he does take are present and super intent-ful," assistant hitting coach Anthony Iapoce declared earlier this season, "more than anybody else on the team."

Tuesday presented a deviation from the norm. At about 3 p.m., Alvarez emerged from the tunnel to the clubhouse, climbed the dugout stairs at Daikin Park and made for the cage set up at home plate. Shortly after followed Jeremy Peña, the shortstop and leadoff hitter mired in a prolonged funk.

In a related development, "I think it was time," Alvarez mentioned, through an interpreter. "It was time to see the ball coming off the bat, and that's one of the reasons that I wanted to go out there today."

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A contender's lineup should not hinge on two hitters, but a lack of other consistent threats in Houston's magnifies the importance of the men who occupy its top two spots. No pair is more critical if the Astros are to accelerate a sputtering offense in the season's final two weeks and, perhaps, the playoffs.

Furthermore, entering Tuesday, the Astros had scored the third-fewest runs in the majors since the trade deadline. In 35 games in that stretch, Peña had a .170 average and .518 OPS. Alvarez, a Triple Crown candidate, had three home runs and 12 RBIs during the same span.

So, four hours before their series opener against Kansas City, the two emerged for early on-field hitting, taking swings against a coach pitching, then a machine.

"We bounced some ideas off each other," Peña mentioned, "and brought them into the game."

Additionally, what ensued, whether the result of one hitting session or not, had to deliver the Astros a shot of hope entering two weeks that will define their season. Peña hit two home runs and Alvarez one in a 4-2 win over the Royals, with which Houston maintained its one-game lead over Texas in the AL West.

Peña and Alvarez combined for all four of the Astros' hits in the win, an indictment on the rest of their lineup - which went 0-for-22 with no walks - that in turn underscores how crucial it seems for both to gain steam. Save for Isaac Paredes, others are not creating offensive impact with any regularity.

"They want to step up and they want to produce for the team, and they know what they mean to our offense," manager Joe Espada noted of Peña and Alvarez.

It is worth noting that "So there's some times where you chase and you get away from your approach and that's very typical. All the great hitters do that. But the good ones do what they did today. They just go back to work, they simplify their process, they try to be short and direct, try to hit the ball to the middle of the field. And those are the results."

Pitch selection has been an issue for Peña, who chased out of the strike zone at a 45.4% clip in August, per Baseball Savant. But his hard-hit rate also dipped to 32.4% last month, compared to 39.1% for the season, while his swing-and-miss rate climbed to 38.6%, well above his full-season 32% rate. He had 10 extra-base hits and a 32.7% strikeout rate in his last 150 plate appearances before Tuesday.

Peña offered a short summation Tuesday night of what he worked on with his swing before the game.