1 key storyline for each club in ALDS Game 2
Will Leitch
@williamfleitchThe first day with a full slate of Division Series games was exciting, exhausting, illustrative and, in its own way, definitive: The whole rest of the series will pivot around what happened in all these Game 1s, in one way or another.
The National League squads get a day off on Sunday, but for the American League teams ... well, Sunday is massive. Here’s a look at the big storylines for each club in the two games on Sunday.
Rangers at Orioles
Rangers lead, 1-0
Jordan Montgomery vs. Grayson Rodriguez
4:07 p.m. ET, FS1
Rangers: Will Jordan Montgomery continue to boost his postseason résumé and put Texas on the doorstep of the ALCS?
The Rangers, in many ways, were built to be a team that won all their theoretical postseason series with their starting pitching: This is a team, after all, that has Jacob deGrom and Max Scherzer on the roster. Injuries have laid waste to that plan, but it turns out, they ended up with a guy pitching like an ace. Montgomery, the other starter they got at the Deadline, has given up a total of two runs in his past five starts, including seven scoreless innings against the Rays in Game 1 of the Wild Card Series. Montgomery, essentially, is pitching like deGrom or Scherzer right now. If he can do it again, the Rangers will be coming back to Arlington in an extremely advantageous position.
Orioles: Are they ever going to get a big hit?
One is somewhat hesitant to attach too much causation to a small sample size -- particularly when narratives are so easy to pluck from the sky -- but it sure looked like the young Orioles, in their first postseason exposure, were antsy, stressed and, without question, pressing. The O’s -- particularly late in the game -- kept getting opportunities to take the lead, and they kept falling short, including a “miscommunication” that led to a crucial caught stealing. They also hit into a pair of double plays and were hitless with runners in scoring position. It was the sort of game that makes a fan want to tear their hair out.
The thing about tightening up in huge moments, though, is that as damaging as it is, all it takes is one breakthrough to open the floodgates. Baltimore has too much talent to miss out on every opportunity in perpetuity. The question is whether those floodgates will open in time … or if this series ends before the Orioles get the chance.
Twins at Astros
Astros lead, 1-0
Pablo López vs. Framber Valdez
8:03 p.m. ET, FS1
Twins: Can their 1-2 rotation combo save them?
The Twins might not have had the best record in the American League or emerged from the best division, but they have something that’s generally the envy of every other team in baseball: Two top-shelf starting pitchers in Pablo López and Sonny Gray. Using both of those pitchers in the Wild Card Series meant neither could start Game 1 of the ALDS, which was one of the (several) reasons the Astros were able to take a 1-0 series lead.
There aren’t many paths for the Twins to defeat the defending champions that don’t feature them winning the two games that López and Gray pitch on full rest. So, suffice it to say, Minnesota needs López, who was fantastic in his Wild Card Series start against the Blue Jays, to come up big in Game 2. In many ways, Game 1 was a bit of a free swing for the Twins, as they tried to pull off a win in a severe pitching disadvantage against Justin Verlander -- and they nearly pulled off a late comeback. Win the two games with their two aces, and no one will remember Game 1.
Astros: Can they keep this historic run of postseason dominance going?
We’ve spent so much time talking about postseason losing streaks -- the Twins’ 18-game skid that was just snapped, the Blue Jays’ and Rays’ seven losses in a row, even the Orioles’ current six in a row -- that we should probably note that the Astros have been blistering through the best stretch baseball has had to offer for a while now. They won the final three games of last year’s World Series and all seven games they played against the American League teams in the 2022 postseason.
With their win Saturday night, they’ve now won 13 of their past 15 playoff games -- a truly astounding streak that doesn’t even account for the fact they made the ALCS (at least) in the five seasons before this hot streak began. Houston has become the definitive postseason success story over the last half-decade. The defending champs are two wins away from reaching their seventh straight ALCS. This can’t go on forever ... can it?