HOUSTON — The lineup failed to produce with runners on base and closer Eric Gagne blew a save Sunday afternoon.

What else is new with the Milwaukee Brewers?

The Houston Astros finally made the Brewers pay for their recent all-too-common sins in the 12th inning. That's when Hunter Pence, 0-for-5 to that point, went to the plate with the game tied at 6 and hit a two-run home run off Mitch Stetter for an 8-6 victory and a sweep of the three-game series.

Houston, which trailed by as many as four runs, trailed by two entering the ninth and got singles from Darin Erstad and Geoff Blum off Gagne before Michael Bourn walked. Erstad scored on a groundout by Kaz Matsui to make it 6-5.

Miguel Tejada then walked to load the bases before Gagne walked Lance Berkman to tie it at 6. Carlos Lee grounded out to send the game into extra innings.

"I put myself in positions I shouldn't have been in," Gagne said. "We played a really good game and I came in and messed it up."

The close calls on some of Gagne's pitches had nothing to do with the result, Brewers manager Ned Yost said.

"There were some calls that could have gone either way that we thought were strikes," Yost said. "But not the majority of them. We're talking two or three pitches."

Ben Sheets was denied his fifth win by Gagne's major league-high fifth blown save.

Sheets was better Sunday than in his last start, when he set a career-high with seven walks. He allowed seven hits and four runs, walked none and had six strikeouts in 6 1⁄3 innings. He needs just one strikeout to tie Teddy Higuera for the franchise record for career strikeouts of 1,081.

Sheets looks to be past the tightness in his right triceps that forced him to leave two starts ago in Cincinnati. He also got his first hit of the season, a run-scoring double in the second that put the Brewers ahead 2-0.

"I felt good," Sheets said.

With two outs in the 12th, Houston's Tim Byrdak (1-0) loaded the bases with walks but Erstad caught J.J. Hardy's pop fly in left field for the final out.

"We had our chances, but we needed to get big hits late in the game," Yost said. "We had runners in scoring position, we just never got those big hits."

In what proved a key play, Sheets was out on a close play at home plate after his hit. He slowed just short of third base to make sure Jason Kendall's double to deep left field would fall in, and Lee started a perfect relay to barely get Sheets.

Sheets didn't slide. Even so, it was a close a play.

"I knew it was going to be close," Sheets said. "(Third-base coach Dale) Sveum let me know it was going to be close. I haven't slid in forever. We work on it a little bit, but it's not like the game."

Should he have slid?

"Of course he should have slid," Yost said. "Come on, we're playing baseball. Yes, he should have slid, but Benny gets on base so few times that it really was like foreign territory."

Mike Cameron had two home runs and four RBIs for Milwaukee. The Astros cut the lead to 2-1 before Cameron led off the third with his first homer. Houston got within one again before Cameron's three-run shot to left center in the fourth on reliever Dave Borkowski's third pitch.

Berkman hit his 10th homer of the season to right field in the second for Houston's first run. His double in the third scored Matsui and pulled the Astros to within 3-2.

Matsui and Berkman both had RBI doubles in the fifth to cut Milwaukee's lead to 6-4. Berkman finished with four RBIs on the day.

Lefty Brian Shouse got the last two outs of the seventh in relief of Sheets for Milwaukee and Guillermo Mota pitched a scoreless eighth before Gagne's terrible ninth.

Jose Valverde pitched a perfect 10th for Houston and Salomon Torres did the same for Milwaukee. Both allowed a single in the 11th, but neither gave up a run to send it to the 12th.