HOUSTON — The stage is set for an interstate showdown and the Silver Boot isn’t the prize up for grabs. It’s the American League championship, and after 324 regular season and eight postseason games between the two, that pennant comes down to a Texas showdown between the Texas Rangers and Houston Astros.
How They Got Here
One of the Astros and Rangers almost didn’t even make the playoffs. The American League West was a mad scramble all the way down to the final game of the season. Once the Rangers put the finishing touches on a 6-1 victory over the Seattle Mariners and the Astros finished shutting out the Arizona Diamondbacks in the season’s penultimate game, only then were both Texas teams assured a spot in the playoffs leaving Seattle as the odd team out.
The AL West title – and the subsequent bye – was settled on the last day of the season. The Astros beat the backed-into-a-wild-card-spot Arizona third-string team and the Rangers came out lifeless against a full-strength Mariners team, getting shut out 1-0, cementing Houston as the division winners via a season head-to-head tiebreaker as both Texas clubs finished the year at 90-72.
That season finale maneuvering earned Houston some fancy division championship merchandise and a ticket straight to the ALDS against the 87-75 AL Central winning Minnesota Twins, who swept the Toronto Blue Jays in the best-of-3 Wild Card round.
The Rangers, meanwhile, were forced to take the long road which saw them required to fight through the Tampa Bay Rays in the other Wild Card round, sweeping them in two games and earning the right to face the 101-win AL East champion Baltimore Orioles in the Division Series.
Texas swept Baltimore convincingly in three games and only had to wait one more day to find out that they would be facing Houston in the best-of-7 ALCS, as the Astros triumphed over the Twins in four games.
The burgeoning Texas rivalry is about to get even more dramatic. If the players that were hot going into the Championship Series remain on point, and both rotations stack up evenly, then it might come down to whoever plays the cleanest baseball.
The Game 1 match-up
Texas Rangers (0-0) @ Houston Astros (0-0), 7:15 PM CST, Minute Maid Park, Houston, Texas – Broadcast on FOX
Starting Pitchers – Jordan Montgomery (10-11, 3.20 ERA) vs. Justin Verlander (13-8, 3.22 ERA)
The game within the game
The Rangers will have to contend with the intimidating playoff resume and seemingly eternal dominance of the 40-year old Justin Verlander. Verlander, who has a 36-game postseason record of 17-11 with a 3.54 ERA, is no stranger to this stage with this team. Even though he came over mid-season from the Mets, Verlander has led this Houston team to a World Series before and shined on the brightest stage.
Verlander took the mound for Houston in Game 1 of the Division Series against the Twins, pitching six scoreless innings. The right-hander faced the Rangers early last month, outdueling Max Scherzer while giving up just one earned run on four hits over seven innings. For his career, Verlander holds a 21-8 record with a 2.60 ERA against Texas. The Rangers also haven’t beaten Justin Verlander in five years.
While anything can happen in the postseason – the Rangers defeated Verlander and his Detroit Tigers in 2011 ALCS in the year Verlander won the AL MVP award – Verlander’s career and history stand as tall as a mountain for the Rangers to climb.
Texas, meanwhile, will send Jordan Montgomery to the mound in Game 1. Montgomery, who started Game 1 of the Wild Card series and Game 2 of the Division Series, was the Rangers’ most steadfast pitcher after coming over from the St. Louis Cardinals at the trade deadline, going 4-2 with a 2.79 ERA in the final two months of the season.
He was often a hard-luck loser, pitching better than good enough to have earned a win, but with the offense coming up quiet on his days. Montgomery faced Houston earlier this season, at the end of June as a member of the St. Louis Cardinals, besting the Astros by pitching 6 ⅔ innings, allowing one earned run on six hits.
In the postseason, Montgomery has had one good start and one rough outing. Against the Rays, the lefty threw seven shutout innings, meaning that the Rangers’ four runs were more than good enough to secure the win. In Game 2 at Baltimore, a pesky Orioles lineup made Montgomery work and he couldn’t make it out of the 5th inning, even though Texas had given him a seven-run cushion.
With righthander Nathan Eovaldi set to start in Game 2, manager Bruce Bochy has some flexibility by having any of Andrew Heaney, Martin Perez, Cody Bradford or Dane Dunning available to back up Montgomery if things go south. That length and depth might be what separates the Texas ‘pen from Houston.
How the Rangers can win
It may be the aggressive part of the “patient aggression” of the Rangers’ plate approach that helps Texas overcome Verlander. With the Mets, Verlander’s walk rate was at nearly a career-high of three per nine innings. Since rejoining Houston, those rates have dropped to 1.9.
Verlander’s control isn’t going to be as wild as some of the pitchers Texas has already seen this postseason, so waiting him out and extending him via pitch count might not be a sound strategy. Attacking the pitches that come into the zone will benefit Texas the most, as the mindset of “not getting another good pitch to hit'' may ring true.
Playing error-free baseball is also going to be key. Texas has been defensively sound down the stretch and through the postseason, with Josh Jung and Jonah Heim being standouts, but otherwise having defensive strengths at nearly every position (as long as Robbie Grossman doesn’t take the field). The Astros capitalize on mistakes and free bases, and while Montgomery alone is responsible for what he throws, he can pitch to contact a little more freely, knowing that the defense behind him will take care of the ball.
The X-Factor for the Rangers, though, might very well be whether Marcus Semien can set the tone at the top of the lineup. Semien has been in a slump, hitting just .174 in the postseason, and while the rest of the team has been able to pick up for the AL’s hit leader in 2023, the Rangers are going to need production from its Iron Man to be successful against an Astros team that matches up very well against Texas.
If Texas can take at least one game from the Astros in Houston, the series gets a little more competitive coming back to a sold-out Globe Life Field. It wouldn’t hurt to get a top shelf performance from Montgomery and a little more from Semien to try to accomplish that out of the gate in Game 1.
Do you think the Rangers will take ALCS Game 1 in Houston? Share your predictions with Matt on Twitter @FisherWritesMLB.