Oct 13 2017

Astros must live in the present because Yankees win the past

Looking at baseball history is extremely daunting when previewing the Houston Astros vs. the New York Yankees playoff matchup.

The Yankees have made playoff appearances in 53 seasons. The Astros have existed for only 56 seasons and have made the playoffs only 11 times, including this season.

The Yankees have won the American league title 40 times. The Astros won the NL title just once, in 2005.

The Yankees won the whole enchilada a world record 27 times! The Astros have a whole bagel on their side of the ledger.

In their 56 years of existence the Astros have won 4 playoff series total, including the just concluded 3-1 win over the Red Sox and have won the only Wild Card playoff they have faced, the one over…..The Yankees….in 2015.

Psychologically, this series could be like trying to beat your father or big brother in a game of one on one when you are only 11 and they are full grown. But it does not have to be that way.

The bottom line is that this Astros team is better than this Yankees team. Yes, the Yanks have all that momentum from winning three times against a Cleveland Indians club that had not lost three in a row in the last two months. The Yanks have the feel good warmth of bailing out their beloved manager Joe Girardi, who manned up and apologized for not appealing a call that led to an unearned grand slam by the Indians and an eventual win in Game 2 of that series.

But momentum can disappear as fast as two games on the road against the Astros’ double ace package.

How do these two teams stack up?

  • For the season, the Astros beat the Yankees 5 out of 7 games; they were 3-1 on the road and 2-1 at home.
  • Two of those games were quite memorable. Back on May 11 in New York, Carlos Correa helped the Astros build a 3-0 lead for Dallas Keuchel with an early two run home run and in the 9th inning when Ken Giles was melting down, Jake Marisnick nailed the tying runner, Jacoby Ellsbury at the plate to end a 3-2 win over the Yanks.  On July 1, the Astros were losing 6-3 headed into the 8th in Houston. Three outs later they were leading 7-6 after doing damage against both setup man Dellin Betances and closer Aroldis Chapman. Yuli Gurriel had the huge go ahead 2 run double against Chapman and then in the 9th used his foot to keep Brett Gardner from getting back to first when he rounded too far on a gapper single. That play also ended the game.

STARTING PITCHING

Overall the numbers for each team’s starting pitchers are really close:

  • The Yanks are fifth in the majors with a 3.98 ERA, 4th in WHIP (1.24) and fifth in OPS against (.713)
  • The Astros are sixth in the majors with a 4.03 ERA, 5th in WHIP (1.26) and sixth in OPS against (.721)
  • The two staffs are effective in different ways – the Yanks are fifth lowest in BBs(279), but 23rd in allowing 141 HRs. The Astrso are 3rd best in allowing only 115 HRs, but 14th in allowing 309 BBs
  • However, matchups are what is interesting. The Yankees are starting the series with Masahiro Tanaka, who was probably their 5th or 6th best starter during the season, somehow squeezing a 13-12 record out of a poor 4.74 ERA. You would think they would go with Sonny Gray or Luis Severino, who is their actual ace. But Tanaka was nails, throwing three hit of shutout ball in the Yanks 1-0 third game win over the Indians, which set the table for their 3 -2 series comeback. His career record against the Astros is 0-2 with a 10.38 ERA in 4 starts and will lead off the series against Dallas Keuchel.
  • The Yanks will start the terrific Severino (14-6 with a 2.98 ERA) against Justin Verlander in the second game, while C.C. Sabathia (14-5 and 3.69) will start the third game against the imposing TBD. And that may be the tale of this series: who does A.J. Hinch use in the third and/or fourth spots in the rotation? Is it Brad Peacock, who was shaky in his one playoff appearance, but also may have been pulled too early? Charlie Morton who was a little better than Peacock? Lance McCullers Jr. who pitched well but not many innings? Collin McHugh who was not on the ALDS 25? Or in this new world of playoff baseball are we looking at some kind of McCullers/Peacock or Morton/McHugh tandem starters for the back or rotation?
  • Starting pitching looks quite even, but it will be the biggest key to this series.

OFFENSE

  • The Yankees were very good in offensive stats in the majors: .262 BA (7th), .339 OBP (2nd), .785 OPS (3rd), 241 HRs (1st)and 858 runs (2nd).
  • The Astros were better, first with .282 BA, .346 OBP, .823 (OPS), 896 runs, and 2nd in HRs with 238.
  • Some interesting differences are that the Astros were 1st in the majors with 346 doubles and best with only 1087 Ks, while the Yankees were 22nd with 266 doubles and 12th with 1386 Ks.
  • Catcher Gary Sanchez gives the Yanks a leg up at that position with a .278/.345/.876 slash along with 33 HR and 90 RBIs, though it will be interesting to see how Brian McCann performs against the team that discarded him for Sanchez.
  • The Infield belongs to the Astros. Both 2B Starlin Castro and SS Didi Gregorious are good to very good, but not as good as Carlos Correa and Jose Altuve. 3B Alex Bregman and 1B Yuli Gurriel are a lot better than the inconsistent 1B Greg Bird and 3B Todd Frazier.
  • The Outfield would seem to be a wash. Aaron Judge is a better power hitter than anyone on the Astros, but George Springer, Josh Reddick and Marwin Gonzalez are all better than Brett Gardner and fairly even with Aaron Hicks.
  • DH will be interesting. Chase Headley and Jacoby Ellsbury are probably better than Carlos Beltran / Evan Gattis, but….Gattis has been hot and Beltran had a huge hit in the clincher against the Red Sox.
  • Offense favors the Astros by a bit, especially if the roll they were on vs. the Red Sox continues.

Relievers

  • The Yanks relievers had much better numbers this season than the Astros. They lead in ERA (3.34 vs. 4.27), WHIP (1.16 vs. 1.28) and OPS against (.621 vs. .719).
  • There are a number of things that stand out about the Yankees’ bullpen. Statistically, Aroldis Chapman probably has the 6th best numbers in the bullpen with his 3.22 ERA and 1.132 WHIP. What also sticks out from the paper are how many of their big arms have big strikeout numbers. David Robertson (13.1 K/9 IP), Chapman (12.3), Dellin Betances (15.1), Tommy Kahnle (12.2) and Chad Green (13.4) all have superior strikeout numbers to go with excellent ERAs, Robertson’s 1.08 ERA leading the group.
  • The Yankees have the edge in the bullpen, though by how much will depend on exactly who is in the Astros bullpen and how they are used. However, as roadthriller pointed out in Chip’s blog the Astros have been very successful against Chapman and Bettances.

Bottom Line

In the playoffs it is often about momentum. Both of these teams come into this series on a psychological high. The Yanks came back from the edge of the pit, being down 2-0. The Astros came back in the rain in Boston with 3 runs in the last two innings to clinch that series. All things being even, the Astros who won 9 more games in the regular season and throttled these Yanks 5-2 should have an edge. They need to hold serve in Houston and then be war warriors in the Big Apple.

Astros in 6 games

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108 comments on “Astros must live in the present because Yankees win the past”

  1. There is a saying: You are who you are.
    In baseball, there is a saying in the clubhouse used during an interview: It is what it is.
    Can you change a horse’s spots?
    The Astros are a hitting machine. They were during the season and they were during the ALDS. We will now get to see if they are in the ALCS.
    Some keys to this series:
    – Joe Musgrove needs to be the attacker again out of the bullpen.
    – Peacock and Morton need to find their sliders again.
    – The Astros need to hit and have fun.
    – Feast on the opposite field if they give it to you.
    – Hit the good pitches. Don’t try to wait the other pitcher out because, they are going to get pulled early anyway, if you score 3 or 4 runs off of them.
    – The Yankees threw a lot of fastballs against the Indians because the Indians don’t hit big fastballs very well. The Astros do hit fastballs well but need to hit some off speed stuff and do damage to keep the Yankee pitchers honest.
    – If Springer is hot, the Astros rock!

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  3. A few things….
    – Of course this would only cover the Wild Card era, but Mike Lupica wrote that no team has beaten both the Red Sox and the Yankees in the same post season.
    – If the Astros run the table – could there be a team that ever faced and beat a bigger set of media darlings than the Red Sox, Yankees and Dodgers/Cubs?
    – My son, Adam, pulls for the smaller market teams to make noise in the playoffs. So this season the Astros are the closest thing to that (haha) with New York, LA and Chicago still in the running…

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  4. Once again, DanP excellent break down. This is going to be fun. One of the great things about getting old is we not only can’t remember what we had for breakfast, we aren’t sure we ate. So this is the first game ever played between these two teams. Yep – FUN. .

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  5. Here is what I have learned today:
    It doesn’t matter what Greg Byrd and Yuli Gurrieski did during an entire season and playoffs. Byrd’s two HRs in the Yankees playoffs means he is a better first baseman than Gurriel.
    It doesn’t matter what Aaron Judge did in the playoffs, his regular season makes him a better player in RF than Josh Reddick. Marwin Gonzalez’s tremendous season doesn’t mean squat when it comes to Brett Garner’s 12- pitch at bat in game 5.
    Tanaka’s bad season and blowout at the hands of the Astros doesn’t mean anything because Tanaka is torrid, and history doesn’t mean anything. Dallas Keuchel and Verlander being torrid at the end of the season means nothing because the Yankees have history of being great.
    Gary Sanchez is historically great as a catcher and Brevan McGattis isn’t really good at anything.
    The Astros won 104 games this year with no bullpen.
    Joe Girardi is a better manager because he overcame a huge mistake in game two, when his world’s Greatest Bullpen also blew up. AJ Hinch’s team managed to overcome Hinch’s mistake of using Verlander in relief in game 4, a game in which Verlander won his second game in a 4-game series.
    The Yankees aren’t tired, they’re hot. The Astros are rested, and cold.
    That Yankee Stadium crowd is loud.
    That Minute Maid crowd is just hoping their team will show up to help them recover from a hurricane.
    Oh yeah, i forgot, the Yankees have the intangibles that the Astros don’t, youth and experience.

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    • OP you are missing the point – they are very consistent in reviewing the teams – NY good – fly over hurricane flood zone – bad.
      The only thing that would make me happier shutting up the national (read this – NY) media by beating the Yankees would be shutting them up more by also beating the Dodgers/Cubs.
      It will be a rocking crowd tonight and tomorrow with the roof closed – I hope the team jumps them early like they did the Red Sox and get this party started.

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      • dan p, I hope you are happy happy after the World Series is done. Astros beat the redsox and the yankees in the playoffs, in the same year. 1st time that has ever happened? go stros!!

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  10. It is irritating to hear the sports talk hosts in our home market debating who will be starters later in the series. They surmise that McCullers will get a start. I think, why??!!! Starting McCullers will turn that game into a bullpen game because he cannot go more than three innings before getting blown up. My opinion is to keep him in the pen and use him for one or two innings to bridge between the starter and the back end of the pen.

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  14. So the Astros turned a hustle infield single and stolen base by Altuve plus an RBI single plus an RBI single by Gurriel into a 2-0 lead.
    And Marwin uncorked another great throw to the plate to end the 5th.

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  18. Altuve keeps separating himself from everyone else. Marwin with a second pinpoint throw, the difference tonight. Might have been the best game I’ve seen called by a home plate ump all season. If this is the Keuchel we get to see for the duration of 2017, we’ve got a pretty good shot at winning this thing. I guess we’ll get to see some of the other guys from the pen on Saturday, unless Verlander decides to throw a CG. Nice opener.

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  19. I thought it was a consistently called game but not the Yankee fans around me. Such Language! (LOL) All in fun though. Giles had us on edge but he came through in the clutch. Altuve, Keuchel, and Marvin…the MVP’s of the game.
    I had to hear why Aaron Judge deserves the MVP award. Ugh!

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  21. No one talks much about Gurriel who knocked in the winning run.
    This deal with Keuchel and the Yankees is a big deal.
    Altuve rocks. Springer is back to his huge wild swings.
    If Marwin doesn’t throw out Bird, we’d be hearing about Judge’s slump-breaking RBI single all weekend.
    Devenski sure could have saved Giles a lot of work tonight if he could throw more than a third of an inning without walking someone.
    Every time Keuchel left a pitch up tonight, they got good wood on it. There weren’t many.
    The Yankees struck out 14 times and the Astros struck out 5 times.
    The Astros did something that the Indians couldn’t do. They beat Tanaka. The Astros need to keep doing that. I loved it when the announcer said that tonight proved the Astros can beat you more than one way.
    Brian McCann did not get a hit tonight, but he was a huge factor in this game.
    A pretty quick turnaround for game 2 tomorrow at 3 pm central time.

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  22. Devo really had me scratching my head tonight. I don’t think he threw a single change up on the walk to Gardner. He had a nice fastball going but he left his best pitch in the locker room. I’m hoping winning this battle doesn’t cost us the war by using Giles for 40+ pitches. We need Verlander to go deep and for the offense to show up so that some of the secondary relievers can get some work and confidence and allow Giles to sit and watch and be available to nail the save Monday night.

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  24. This Astros team is reminding me that baseball really is still a team game. Every win results from the efforts of multiple heroes. And the bullpen may be our biggest strength (switching to tongue-in-cheek font): no matter what, they always keep it interesting!

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    • So basically the only players the Yankees have to worry about are Altuve and Keuchel and they don’t have to worry about Keuchel for a few games so they should sweep the next four.
      Yeah Sandy we will get to worry about this until we knock these guys out.

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  30. We better hope our guys get 10+ runs today, because Hinch is thinking about using Harris to close. Folks……I don’t think Harris is healthy.
    Let’s win *2*!!!

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  31. Today is the kind of game we hope JV grabs by the throat. In the playoffs where the bullpens are throwing too many innings – how about a complete game?
    Yeah I know too much to ask but if you don’t ask….

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  32. A-Rod on Fox pre-game says Verlander is a fly ball pitcher who will give up homers to the Yanks – so I just sold my home and am betting everything on the Yanks. What do ya think

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  33. Verlander breezes thru the first inning. Astros get a 2 out hit by ….Altuve and a walk but Marwin who should be swapped in the lineup with Gurriel strands the pair.

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  34. Verlander continues looking excellent – he gives up a hit on a shattered bat infield nubber and after Bregman hits into a double play we move on to the 3rd 0-0.

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  35. In the third inning – Reddick catches one crashing into the RF fence. Then he starts a relay to Correa to Bregman that a replay flips to an out at third on Gardner’s try for a triple. Astros are struggling at bat today.

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  36. Verlander gives up two doubles in the fifth and Severino is replaced possibly because of a grounder off his arm – it is 1-1 going to the 6th.

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  38. When Verlander came into the dugout and no one greeted him after the seventh inning, you knew that 96 pitches was not going to be it for him. He averaged 109 a game for the year.

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  42. Wow! Wow! Astros win! Altuve singles and comes around on Correa’s double – the Yanks had the shot to get him but dropped the ball.
    Verlander – outstanding and gets the complete game. Altuve and Correa are great and clutch!

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  48. I was literal jumping up and down in the sports bar, and cheering. And I thought I was too old for that stuff. What a clutch performance by Verlander, Altuve and CC.

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  50. Wow how just spectacular, walk off win, 43,000 going nuts, JV is 8-0 as Astro. TY JL for not listening to whole lot of fans. Now we go to Yankee stadium and we will start hitting again, besides Tuve and CC WAHOO

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