When the schedule makers made this schedule I believe they thought they were setting up a 4 game set between the two titans of the AL. However baseball is a funny sport in that one team while in the thick of it is fighting for their division while the other team is on the verge of falling out of the race altogether. Don't kid yourself Yankee fans are pissed and this time it is looking inwards and not at the Astros.
I don't know if I said this or not but in the last year I've been working from home for a company whose HQ is in Conneticut and secondary office in Manhattan. Many of co-workers are Yankee fans. Most of last August and September I sat in meetings and kept my mouth shut, although my background kept changing between different Astros logos and pictures. The tears in October in my meetings were delicious. Early this season the Yankee's looked like they would be the team to make a move and the Astros were falling behind I got a couple quiet jabs. Fast forward and now Yankee fans fall in to two categories. The first are fans who are pissed at their GM (Cashman) that they didn't make moves to get better by trying to buy everyone. The second group are fans who are pissed at their GM that they didn't sell the few non-Judge players they have and get a bunch of prospects and try again next year. Both of these groups are real and the one thing they all have in common is that they are all pissed at Cashman and long for the days of the Boss running the show. The Boss's son is extremely underwhelming to them.
Not going to lie, growing up the Astros were in the NL and never played the Yankees. I hated the Mets going back to the 1986. Thus all the stories my mom told me of spending her summers in the 60s going to Yankee stadium with her brother to watch Yogi Berra and Mickey Mantle gave me a romantic view of the Yankees. I sort of liked the Yankees all those years. Even when they started playing inter-league play a series against the Yankees was an oddity not a rivalry.
Fast forward to 2015 wild card game and the hatred started to begin and now it is very real.
So where do the Astros sit going into the Bronx? We are currently 0.5 games back of the Rangers (although they play a day game today so very likely to be 1 full game back). The Astros sit in the #2 wildcard 3 games behind TB and 2 games ahead of the Blue Jays. However the Astros sit 4.5 games ahead of the Red Sox and 5.5 in front of the Yankees and Mariners (who have already thrown in the towel) and 6 in front of the "All In" Angels. The Astros in a tough stretch with 4 in the Bronx followed up by 3 in Baltimore ( the team with the best record in the AL only behind Atlanta in all of MLB) while at the same time the Rangers have one more with the Chi-Sox and 3 against Miami before going to Oakland and San Francisco. The schedule doesn't favor the Astros at the moment but they can still make a move. The team appears to have some juice that may not have been there a week or so ago. Lets make a run against this schedule and put the pressure on the Rangers.
Now on to business and this weekends pitching matchups
Thursday August 3 6:15PM (on Fox not sure if also on local)
Christian Javier vs Clarke Schmidt - This favors the Astros and if we get good Javier the Yankees may have some PTSD, we got to take care of business and get this series off on the right foot
Friday August 4 6:05 (this game is on AppleTV)
Hunter Brown vs Luis Severino - Severino hasn't been good this year and his last outing he 3.1 innings and gave up 9 ER to the Orioles. Brown had a rough stretch but followed it up with 2 straight outing where he went 6 innings giving up 2ER (road vs Oak and home vs TB)
Saturday August 5 12:05PM
TBD vs Nestor Cortes - This will be Cortes first game since May 30 when he went on to the 60-day IL and originally was supposed to get another rehab start instead of going to Scranton he travelled to the Bronx. They are saying he is stretched out to 60 pitches. Currently the Astros pitcher is listed as TBD, however most believe this will be the debut of newly acquired pitcher Justin Verlander. Not going to lie, I don't know what to expect her other than I expect JV to jazzed up as well as the batters. Sometimes this is really good and sometimes this really bad. I think JV can control it and will likely go at least 7.
Sunday August 6 12:35PM
TBD vs Carlos Rodon - Rodon is finally healthy and has started 5 games for the Yankees and he is 1-4. He has had some control issues and actually only given up 20 hits in the those 24.1 innings however 6 of those hits are homers. The Astros TBD is likely to be Urquidy although I've heard talk of them having him ready for a relief appears as with days off (including Ronel starting yesterday) a 6 man rotation might be overkill for the next week or two. So who knows this could be JP France. I like the idea of Urquidy and the getting France, Valdez, Javier in Baltimore, but it isn't my call.
So one thing that I found interesting is that based on Dusty's explanation of Yordan and Altuve's off days it sounds like they should both play all 4 in the Bronx.
I don't know if I said this or not but in the last year I've been working from home for a company whose HQ is in Conneticut and secondary office in Manhattan. Many of co-workers are Yankee fans. Most of last August and September I sat in meetings and kept my mouth shut, although my background kept changing between different Astros logos and pictures. The tears in October in my meetings were delicious. Early this season the Yankee's looked like they would be the team to make a move and the Astros were falling behind I got a couple quiet jabs. Fast forward and now Yankee fans fall in to two categories. The first are fans who are pissed at their GM (Cashman) that they didn't make moves to get better by trying to buy everyone. The second group are fans who are pissed at their GM that they didn't sell the few non-Judge players they have and get a bunch of prospects and try again next year. Both of these groups are real and the one thing they all have in common is that they are all pissed at Cashman and long for the days of the Boss running the show. The Boss's son is extremely underwhelming to them.
Not going to lie, growing up the Astros were in the NL and never played the Yankees. I hated the Mets going back to the 1986. Thus all the stories my mom told me of spending her summers in the 60s going to Yankee stadium with her brother to watch Yogi Berra and Mickey Mantle gave me a romantic view of the Yankees. I sort of liked the Yankees all those years. Even when they started playing inter-league play a series against the Yankees was an oddity not a rivalry.
Fast forward to 2015 wild card game and the hatred started to begin and now it is very real.
So where do the Astros sit going into the Bronx? We are currently 0.5 games back of the Rangers (although they play a day game today so very likely to be 1 full game back). The Astros sit in the #2 wildcard 3 games behind TB and 2 games ahead of the Blue Jays. However the Astros sit 4.5 games ahead of the Red Sox and 5.5 in front of the Yankees and Mariners (who have already thrown in the towel) and 6 in front of the "All In" Angels. The Astros in a tough stretch with 4 in the Bronx followed up by 3 in Baltimore ( the team with the best record in the AL only behind Atlanta in all of MLB) while at the same time the Rangers have one more with the Chi-Sox and 3 against Miami before going to Oakland and San Francisco. The schedule doesn't favor the Astros at the moment but they can still make a move. The team appears to have some juice that may not have been there a week or so ago. Lets make a run against this schedule and put the pressure on the Rangers.
Now on to business and this weekends pitching matchups
Thursday August 3 6:15PM (on Fox not sure if also on local)
Christian Javier vs Clarke Schmidt - This favors the Astros and if we get good Javier the Yankees may have some PTSD, we got to take care of business and get this series off on the right foot
Friday August 4 6:05 (this game is on AppleTV)
Hunter Brown vs Luis Severino - Severino hasn't been good this year and his last outing he 3.1 innings and gave up 9 ER to the Orioles. Brown had a rough stretch but followed it up with 2 straight outing where he went 6 innings giving up 2ER (road vs Oak and home vs TB)
Saturday August 5 12:05PM
TBD vs Nestor Cortes - This will be Cortes first game since May 30 when he went on to the 60-day IL and originally was supposed to get another rehab start instead of going to Scranton he travelled to the Bronx. They are saying he is stretched out to 60 pitches. Currently the Astros pitcher is listed as TBD, however most believe this will be the debut of newly acquired pitcher Justin Verlander. Not going to lie, I don't know what to expect her other than I expect JV to jazzed up as well as the batters. Sometimes this is really good and sometimes this really bad. I think JV can control it and will likely go at least 7.
Sunday August 6 12:35PM
TBD vs Carlos Rodon - Rodon is finally healthy and has started 5 games for the Yankees and he is 1-4. He has had some control issues and actually only given up 20 hits in the those 24.1 innings however 6 of those hits are homers. The Astros TBD is likely to be Urquidy although I've heard talk of them having him ready for a relief appears as with days off (including Ronel starting yesterday) a 6 man rotation might be overkill for the next week or two. So who knows this could be JP France. I like the idea of Urquidy and the getting France, Valdez, Javier in Baltimore, but it isn't my call.
So one thing that I found interesting is that based on Dusty's explanation of Yordan and Altuve's off days it sounds like they should both play all 4 in the Bronx.
