The Houston Astros found themselves down 4-0 after one inning via a couple of key hits by the Texas Rangers and couple of miscues on defense, but they fought back to claw their way back into Game 2 of the ALCS via two Yordan Álvarez homers and a longball by Alex Bregman.
The team from Space City had a key opportunity in the bottom of the 5th inning when the loaded the bases with no out, but subsequent strikeouts by Yanier Díaz and José Altuve followed by a groundout by José Altuve squandered the opportunity.
Texas defeated Houston 5-4 and this stanza loomed heavily on the final outcome of the game. I was able to catch-up with Astros’ skipper Dusty Baker after the contest and posed the question to the manager, below is what he said, plus the excerpts from last night’s press conference after Game 2 of the ALCS.
Dusty Baker talks to us about that pivotal fifth inning in last night's game.#CubanBaseballDigest #Postseason #Ready2Reign pic.twitter.com/DmDoe2KnBG
— Cuban Baseball Digest (@CBaseballDigest) October 17, 2023
Did you think Framber lost his composure at all after that error in the first inning?
You mean his error?
Yes.
No, not really. Like they put some balls in there, only a couple of them hit hard. No, I don’t think he lost his composure. His pitch count got real high in a hurry. But we had action with bases loaded and nobody out and we couldn’t push any runs across and we had a couple of opportunities and our bullpen did an outstanding job. And then we just couldn’t push across that tying and winning run. Yordan, he had a great game. And we came up short.
How disappointing was it to having the bases loaded with no outs and coming up empty?
It’s very disappointing. But the guys up there are doing their damnedest to push those runs across. And Eovaldi made some quality pitches after we had him in trouble. And like I said before, you know, the name of the game is RBIs. So we just didn’t push those runs across.
How much did not getting anyone across weigh in on the final outcome?
You lose by one run, it weighs heavily. You don’t know which inning is going to be the inning of decision and the deciding run. They pushed across four quickly. I thought we would have pushed a crooked number across, but like I said, we didn’t do it.
What have you seen from Tucker’s at-bats?
Well, he hit the ball good a couple of times tonight, better than he had been before. And it’s frustrating when you’re not getting hits. And I’m sure he’s frustrated. We need Tuck. He’s a big part of our team, big part of our offense. And I just know that Tucker will come across and come through with it in Texas.
Have you made a decision, can you tell us who’s going in Game 3 or 4?
We know Game 3 already, Game 3 is Javier.
What did you see from Framber early, what was going on with him?
Well, you know, like I said, there was a ball up the middle that went off Jeremy’s glove and that was a near out. And then the jammed shot by Seager. And then the base hit to right. And then the play that he has a lot of soft contact, which he did, which Grossman hit that ball back to him and he looked to third. He was going to go to third and bobbled and threw wildly to first. If you get an out there the bases are loaded now with nobody out versus at least one out. And it was just a matter of bad occurrences in a short period of time.