HOUSTON – Tim Redding pitched six scoreless innings and Lance Berkman homered, leading the Houston Astros over the Pittsburgh Pirates 5-2 Sunday.

Redding (6-8) scattered five hits in winning his second straight start following a four-game losing streak. He struck out five and walked one as the Astros held onto the NL Central lead heading into the All-Star break.

Brad Lidge pitched a scoreless seventh, and Octavio Dotel gave up a two-run homer to Aramis Ramirez in the eighth. Billy Wagner got three straight outs for his 25th save in 28 chances.

Josh Fogg (5-4) went only two innings and gave up three runs on five hits and two walks.

Fogg ran into control problems in the first inning, walking Jeff Bagwell and Berkman and hitting Richard Hidalgo and Morgan Ensberg with pitches in consecutive at-bats. The latter drove in the first run, and the Astros made it 2-0 on Craig Biggio’s RBI single in the second.

Berkman’s 17th home run leading off the third tied him with Bagwell and Ensberg for the team lead.

Hidalgo helped protect the 3-0 lead in the fourth when he threw out Randall Simon trying to stretch a single into a double with a long throw from the right-field corner. It was Hidalgo’s 12th assist of the season, second among major league outfielders to Jose Cruz Jr.’s 13 for San Francisco.

Simon was playing his first game after serving a three-game suspension for hitting a Milwaukee Brewers’ sausage mascot with his bat last Wednesday.

Bagwell had an RBI single in the fourth, and Geoff Blum added a run-scoring single in the sixth.

Notes: Pirates catcher Jason Kendall extended his career-high hitting streak to 18 games. … Blum’s hitting streak reached 15 games. … Bagwell needs one home run to tie Dale Murphy for 34th on the career list with 398. He needs three to become the first Astros player to reach 400.

AP-ES-07-13-03 1704EDT