It's clear to me now that this ALCS isn't going to be simple. The Rangers aren't going to finish this thing in four, but they're not exactly going to keel over and die either.
The Astros welcoming Max Scherzer back from the IL with a barrage of runs is something I figured was possible but hoped wouldn't happen. It was all too predictable. "Oh, wait til they see our secret weapon", and then he shows up and does nothing. Did they rush Scherzer? Possibly? But at the same time, oh noooo, not Dane Dunning or Jon Gray starting a game, ANYTHING but that...
The Astros scoring 8 runs doesn't shock me either. They're the Astros, they do this. Alvarez was responsible for 3 of them, of course he was, he's a force of nature and I curse the baseball gods that he wound up in Houston rather than someplace cool. Cristian Javier was great in this start despite not doing well during the regular season, of course he was. Cristian Javier exists solely to defy me at this point. I used to be fine with him, now he's infuriating as hell. You no hit both my teams in one season, you get on my shit list, and he's there.
Two of the other heroes from this game, Jose Altuve and Martin Maldonado, are already on said list. Altuve had a massive homer that was basically just the Astros' way of showing off. Maldonado had a pair of RBIs himself. Maldonado used to have some charm to him, but he makes the playoffs every year and gets to be a postseason hero despite being a below average catcher. He's in it for the t-shirts at this point. It's nice when he has a cool moment, and last year his cool moment was leaning into a pitch in order to bring up the guy that'd seal the World Series win, but he's worn out his novelty for me.
The Rangers did a lot right in this game, including scoring 5 points off the bullpen, playing incredible defense and robbing Jose Altuve of a few other near-homers, and getting a 2-homer night out of Josh Jung. Last game, Alvarez had 2 homers in a loss, now Jung gets to do the same. The Rangers could very easily just make it an easy win [like Arizona], but they're bloodthirsty, and they're not going down without a fight.
The Rangers have two more games at home, one of which is certainly going to be played with a series lead. Tonight I assume they're putting up either Dane Dunning or Andrew Heaney [probably Heaney], while Houston will likely be going with Jose Urquidy. This is manageable. They just need to keep focused and play the same kind of defense and late-game-ferocity that they did last night. I'm not worried yet. We'll see how this one goes.
Also tonight we've got Phils-D'Backs round 3. Brandon Pfaadt vs. Ranger Suarez. With a home crowd that will be diluted by Philly fans who saw cheap tickets on stubhub and couldn't resist the opportunity. Oh boy.
As a Mets fan, I see no reason to think Scherzer wouldn't have been that bad even if he hadn't been injured. Look at how he performed in big games last year.
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