There’s some comedy here.
What Happened
Boston 12, Houston 3
The Houston Astros cannot stop giving up grand slams. Especially in the early innings. On Saturday, it was one in the first and one in the second. Yesterday, it was another in the second. Things started to slip for Houston, Boston was dialing up the pressure, and—POW. Grand slam. Then, again. Then, two days later, again.
Last night’s came courtesy of one Kyle Schwarber, who, after Jose Altuve turned a potential inning-ending double-play ball into zero outs and a second run for the Red Sox, put a ball into that reach of the upper atmosphere they’d use to send ICBM’s to China if the need ever arose—the lower reaches of space, effectively. Kyle Schwarber approached nature’s catwalk. When it reentered, the ball dropped into the right field seats, and the rout was on. A Christian Arroyo homer in the third made it 9-0, and the Red Sox danced their way to a 2-1 series lead, forcing the Astros to either plumb the depths of their bullpen (well, not the depths, but we’ll get to Zack Greinke) or put a position player out there. They chose the former, and thankfully, for them, escaped without having to get more than 30 pitches from any one reliever, but still: There are two games to go in Boston. And the Astros cannot stop giving up grand slams.
The Heroes
Win Probability Added leaders, from FanGraphs:
- Eduardo Rodriguez (0.14) – Six innings, three earned runs, seven strikeouts, zero walks
- Schwarber (0.11)
- J.D. Martinez (0.10) – Double helped set up the Schwarber grand slam
What It Means
The Red Sox take over the mantle of World Series favorites, checking in at 36.8% likely on FanGraphs and…oh, the market still favors Atlanta? I…I don’t know, guys. The market’s been low on the Red Sox all year. Maybe they’ll be right.
Looking at the rest of the series, FanGraphs has the Red Sox 68.2% likely to win the pennant, which is comparable to a Yankees/Orioles single-game probability if you’re looking for a touchpoint.
Other Notes
- Martinez also homered, as did Rafael Devers.
- Kike Hernández and Christian Vázquez each had two hits.
- Kyle Tucker homered for the Astros.
***
Now, today. Chronologically, of course:
The Basics
Where: Dodger Stadium
When: 5:08 PM EDT
Broadcast: TBS
Starting Pitchers: Walker Buehler (LA); Charlie Morton (ATL)
Odds: LA -175; ATL +160; o/u 7½ (u -120) [English translation: The Dodgers are roughly 63% likely to win; Atlanta’s roughly 37% likely to win; the expected number of runs scored is something like 7.3]
The Details
Can Walker Buehler right the ship for Los Angeles? Does the ship really need to be righted?
You could make an argument that the Dodgers have just been spectacularly unlucky. Their xOBP is something like .333 to Atlanta’s .258, the two are even in home runs, and Game 2, as we talked about at length yesterday, was decided by inch after inch after inch. Clearly, the Dodgers aren’t NLCS favorites right now, needing to win four straight or four of their next five games, but they should at least have a split, and the guy taking the mound tonight had the ninth-best FIP in Major League Baseball this year. He was nearly the ERA leader. He’s a great, great pitcher.
Unfortunately for the Dodgers, Atlanta’s trotting out the guy who had the tenth-best FIP in MLB on the season. Charlie Morton’s been every bit as good as Buehler on the year by that metric, and while Buehler ate more innings and stranded more runners and managed a better BABIP (thanks in part to contact quality—Buehler leads in xERA, 3.08 to 3.32), Morton brings this closer to even. The Dodgers have the better bats. The Dodgers have the deeper bullpen. But they’re playing with all the pressure on them, and they’re facing a phenomenal arm in Morton.
The Stars
You could make a case that Atlanta really needs to win this game. It’s a case worthy of skepticism, but it goes something like, “Leading the Dodgers 2-1 when you’re as worse than them as Atlanta is isn’t a good place to be. You might be an underdog. Also, that will mean they’ve remembered how to beat you, and if they remember they can, it is likely that they will.” I’m not making that case, but there’s an element here where, sure, Atlanta needs to win two of these next up-to-five, and if they don’t win tonight, it gets a lot more even, especially with the Dodgers’ built-in talent advantage.
Anyway, with that in mind, look to whether Freddie Freeman can make things happen tonight. Rough first two games from him, which is such a small sample but, as we said sometime last week, playoff baseball is still a kind of baseball, and you have to be able to perform in it just like you have to be able to perform in the regular season if you want to win a championship. It doesn’t matter if Freeman’s unlucky or just playing badly. The effect is the same.
***
And in the AL:
The Basics
Where: Fenway Park
When: 8:08 PM EDT
Broadcast: FS1
Starting Pitchers: Nick Pivetta (BOS); Zack Greinke (HOU)
Odds: BOS -125; HOU +115; o/u 10 (u -115) [English translation: The Red Sox are roughly 54% likely to win; the Astros are roughly 46% likely to win; the expected number of runs scored is something like 9.9]
The Details
Zack Greinke. Remember him? Aside from one inning of work in the Astros’ Game 3 ALDS loss, he hasn’t been seen this postseason, having struggled late in the year. Over the season as a whole, Greinke put up a 4.71 FIP and 4.42 xERA, both juiced by his 1.58 HR/9 rate, his highest since his rookie campaign back in 2004. After the All-Star break, his FIP was 5.94, and his HR/9 was 2.26. He struggled.
Looking a bit deeper…his spin rates hung around the same level all year. His velocity was similarly consistent. The home runs really seem to have been the problem, and looking at xFIP, which is very different from xERA (xERA is predicted ERA based on strikeouts, walks, and contact quality—launch angle and exit velocity; xFIP is FIP but if you then assume everyone’s HR/FB ratio will turn out the same in the end), his xFIP after the All-Star break was just 4.31, implying that home runs were the core of the problem. Of course, with the wind again blowing out towards right field tonight, the weather cold but not brutally cold, and the Red Sox hitting home runs like a kid who unlocked the aluminum bat in Backyard Baseball, this isn’t a big consolation for those hoping for Greinke to succeed tonight. Still, it was a ten-outing sample, that post-All-Star break stretch. I’m curious how predictive it really is. Either way, the thing to watch is whether Greinke can keep the ball in the ballpark. If he does, he might both save the Astros’ season and earn himself a World Series start or two down the line.
For the Red Sox, Pivetta is not a 37-year-old legend trying to keep aflame the embers of a magnificent career. But he has struggled at times, suffering a 6.02 ERA as a Phillies rookie in 2017 (it was a terrible ERA/FIP split, with xERA on FIP’s side), a 5.47 FIP in 2019 (no reprieve from xERA this time), and finally a trade to Boston in 2020 that was, at the time, of little note. This year, the 28-year-old broke back through, approaching his 2018 career-bests in FIP and xERA while helping hold together a sometimes-teetering Red Sox rotation. At season’s end, he was sent to the bullpen, where his first outing was a three-out save in the playoff-clinching game in Washington, his second outing was an innings-eating performance in the ALDS opener, and his third outing was a sensational four-inning, seven-strikeout, one-walk, scoreless stint in innings 10 through 13 of the ALDS’s Game 3. He’s riding high, and clips of him storming off the mound that night, screaming triumphantly, will show that when they’re interspersed this evening.
Overall, though, Pivetta and Greinke aren’t an uneven match. Pivetta’s projected FIP, by FanGraphs’s Depth Charts system, is 4.54. Greinke’s is 4.32. Each is capable of working a normal starter’s workload. Each will likely be on a very quick hook. In a roundabout way, these guys are meeting in the middle, which will likely create a tight one at Fenway Park.
The Stars
Let’s talk about J.D. Martinez for a minute. In 2018, his first season in Boston, he posted an outstanding 170 wRC+, third-highest in the league. He was worth 5.9 fWAR, even spending a lot of time as a DH. Since then, he’s aged, and after a horrible 2020, he’s been a solid hitter this year, finishing his 33-year-old season with a 128 wRC+ and 2.9 fWAR to his name. In the playoffs, it’s been a whole new thing, as the veteran, playing on a banged-up ankle, enters tonight’s game with a stupid-good .423/.464/.846 slash line. Can he stay hot? We’ll see. If he does, having him behind the excellent Devers/Bogaerts/Verdugo heart of the order, and having that heart of the order behind the sizzling Kike Hernández, and having Hernández behind the ever-professional Schwarber puts Boston in a great spot. They didn’t have the Astros’ regular season at the plate. They’re making up for it now.
