3 biggest questions for today's LCS games
Will Leitch
@williamfleitchThe fun part about these two League Championship Series is that they are a wonderful mix of the familiar and the party-crashers. We could have a rematch of last year’s World Series … and we could also have a D-backs-Rangers World Series, which no one on the planet could have possibly predicted six months ago. (Or one month ago, really.) And on Monday, we get to watch all of it happen on the same day, right after one another.
There is only one other day -- Thursday, when we’ll get ALCS Game 4 and NLCS Game 3 -- that we’re guaranteed to have two games on the schedule on the same day. So soak it up while we have the opportunity. These are the early games of each series, but they’re the pivotal ones: They’re setting the stage for all the madness to come. And they’re likely to have a fair bit of madness themselves.
Here's a look at three key storylines for each of the LCS games on Monday.
Rangers at Astros
Rangers lead 1-0
Nathan Eovaldi vs. Framber Valdez
4:37 p.m. ET, FOX/FS1
Storyline No. 1: Can the Astros make their fans forget Alex Bregman’s homer-turned-double-play from Game 1?
When Alex Bregman hit that ball off Aroldis Chapman -- a pitcher who hasn’t given up a run in the postseason but sure feels like he has -- in the bottom of the eighth inning of Game 1, we thought the game was tied, you thought the game was tied, Bregman thought the game was tied and, one suspects, even Chapman thought the game was tied. But when Evan Carter caught the ball next to the Crawford Boxes at Minute Maid Park, and then (eventually, after a replay) doubled up Jose Altuve at first, what looked like a game-turning moment became yet another moment of Rangers postseason kismet. (The Astros wouldn’t put another runner on the rest of the game.)
It’s too soon to start declaring any moment in this series all that pivotal, but Astros fans had been waiting all night to have something to cheer for. When they and Bregman were thwarted, the big moment vanished. And the Rangers remained in charge.
Storyline No. 2: Is Nathan Eovaldi secretly one of the most clutch postseason pitchers of our era?
As a member of the Boston Red Sox, Eovaldi came on in relief in Game 4 of the 2021 ALCS against Houston and got shelled, giving up four runs in 2/3 of an inning. Let’s pretend for a moment that that appearance -- which came in a game the Sox lost 9-2 -- didn’t happen. Take away that game, and check out what Eovaldi’s lifetime numbers in his 12 other postseason appearances are:
56 IP
13 ER
2.09 ERA
6 Wins
That includes his famous six innings in the 18-inning World Series Game 3 for the Red Sox in 2018, a lifesaver of a performance that is widely credited with laying the groundwork for the Sox to win that series. That also includes the two games he has pitched already this postseason, both Rangers victories, both fantastic performances: 6 2/3 IP, 1 R in a Game 2 win over the Rays in the Wild Card Series, and 7 IP, 1 R in the deciding Game 3 against the Orioles in the ALDS. He now faces the Astros again, two years after that forgettable outing with Boston, with the opportunity to put Texas up 2-0 heading home. Eovaldi isn’t thought of as an all-timer of a postseason starter like, say, a Madison Bumgarner. Perhaps he should be?
Storyline No. 3: Have the Rangers fully turned the tables on the Astros?
The Astros’ regular-season dominance of the Rangers this year -- and really for a few years now -- is well-documented. They won nine of 13 against the Rangers in 2023, most notably stealing the division crown from them on the season’s final day, not to mention sweeping them in their final regular-season meeting, three games in Arlington from Sept. 4-6. Every time the Rangers tried to pull away from the Astros this year, they’d end up playing the Astros and losing. But that’s a word you don’t associate with the Rangers this postseason: Losing.
Their Game 1 victory was their sixth playoff win in a row, and only the second game this postseason they won by fewer than three runs. They’re just rolling through everybody right now, and after several seasons of being under the Astros’ thumb, that includes their longtime tormentors. If the Rangers can make it seven in a row, they can head back to Arlington with the very real possibility of vanquishing their rivals in front of their home fans. Minute Maid Park will be rollicking for Game 2 on Monday afternoon. At least it better be.
D-backs at Phillies
Series tied 0-0
Zac Gallen vs. Zack Wheeler
8:07 p.m. ET, TBS
Storyline No. 1: Will one of these starting pitchers emerge as the series’ dominant player?
The age of the starting pitcher who can essentially win three games of a seven-game series is behind us. These are two of the best pitchers in baseball, and neither one of them has made it out of the seventh inning so far this postseason. (That Rob Thomson pushed Wheeler into the seventh of Game 2 against the Braves may have been his only mistake this postseason.) So don’t expect complete game shutouts or anything. But there’s no question that almost any path for either one of these teams to win this series starts with Gallen and Wheeler pitching like the aces they are. It’s particularly vital for Gallen, who doesn’t have Aaron Nola behind him. Gallen winning his two starts is one of the best ways for the D-backs to move on; if he can win them Game 1, this series will be turned upside down right from the get-go.
Storyline No. 2: Can the D-backs keep hitting like this?
The D-backs hitters are peaking right now, to say the least; they certainly wouldn’t have won only 84 games if they’d been hitting like this all year. They have four guys hitting like Barry Bonds this postseason: Gabriel Moreno (1.107 OPS in the playoffs), Christian Walker (1.023 OPS), Ketel Marte (.984) and of course Corbin Carroll (1.389), who is having himself a real superstar coming-out party this October. The D-backs’ pitching has been good, and their bullpen has emerged as a strength, but the reason they have yet to lose a single game in the playoffs is because their lineup is just jumping all over teams. (The Dodgers still don’t know what hit them.) The D-backs are the surprise story of October, but if you have only watched them this postseason, you would wonder how anyone had ever beaten them at all. After all, in the playoffs, nobody yet has.
Storyline No. 3: Can Citizens Bank Park again tilt a series?
It is intimidating to watch all those Philadelphia fans -- who never sit down, who never stop screaming, who keep finding creative ways to get in opposing fans’ heads, who are just relentless -- when you are simply a fan watching at home. Can you imagine how all-encompassing it is when you’re on the opposing team? You watch: At some point in this series, some D-backs player is going to be quoted saying something that is considered vaguely controversial to the Phillies or their fans, and then 43,000 people are going to be screaming that thing back at that player, in unison, every time that player steps on the field. And this is going to happen every night at The Bank.
There’s no greater show in baseball right now than the thunderdome that’s happening in Philadelphia, with a fanbase that is elevating a team that seems to share something intrinsic to the civic character. Every pitch in Philly feels like a hurricane. What a show.