The identity of the second team in the American League Championship Series became official before the NL Championship Series started — barely. There’s no rest for the New York Yankees, who will begin the ALCS in Houston against their bitter rivals the Astros barely 24 hours after eliminating the Cleveland Guardians in the ALDS early Tuesday night.
But who will that help? Here’s our breakdown of the ALCS, with a prediction and one fun prop bet at the end. All odds as of Wednesday afternoon from DraftKings.
No. 1 Houston Astros (106-56) vs. No. 2 New York Yankees (99-63)
Regular season series: Astros 5-2
Series/pennant odds: Astros -210, Yankees +175
World Series odds: Astros +140, Yankees +350
Sure, the chalk held in the AL, but in the process it turned the Yankees into the scrappy, gritty underdogs and the sentimental favorites after 120 years as the team everyone else has chased!
OK, most of America has probably moved on from the Astros’ 2017 cheating scandal, which may as well have happened 500 years ago, and given the Yankees’ polarizing nature, any non-Yankees fans are probably begrudgingly rooting for the Astros, who have eliminated the Yankees three times — in the 2015 wild card game and in the ALCS in 2017 and 2019 — in the last seven seasons.
But the Yankees look like the underdog here, at least on paper against the Astros, who entered the playoffs as the clear AL favorite and are now the last 100-win team standing following the chaos that reigned over the first two rounds in the NL.
The Astros came within a pair of Yankees’ walk-off wins of sweeping the season series. During a four-game series in the Bronx in late June, the Astros held the Yankees hitless for 15 consecutive innings spanning three games, the second of which was an actual no-hitter produced by Cristian Javier, Hector Neris and Ryan Pressly.
And while the Yankees were riding the roller coaster — first by racing out to a 58-23 start, which had them on an even-better-than-the-’98-Yankees 116-win pace, and then by going 14-22 from Aug. 1 through Sept. 9 as their AL East lead dwindled to 3 1/2 games — the Astros were a consistent machine. Houston moved into first place for good on May 17, after which it went 83-43 and lost as many as three straight games just twice.
Five everyday players for the Astros collected at least 4.5 in WAR, per Baseball Reference, and likely Cy Young Award winner Justin Verlander roared back from Tommy John surgery by leading the league with 18 wins and a 1.75 ERA at age 39. Surefire AL MVP Aaron Judge hit 62 homers and produced 10.6 WAR for the Yankees, whose second-, third- and fourth-best position players — Gleyber Torres, DJ LeMahieu and Isiah Kiner-Falafa — combined for 10.9 WAR. Their most consistent starter was Nestor Cortes, the diminutive lefty who bounced between the Yankees, Baltimore Orioles and Seattle Mariners before emerging as an unlikely All-Star.
The Astros also took a clearer path to the ALCS by sweeping the Mariners in the AL Division Series while the Yankees needed five games over eight days — and had to overcome a two games to one deficit — to dispatch of the Guardians.
But…if this wacky March Madness-styled postseason has taught us anything, it’s that momentum supersedes any sort of apparent talent edge. In the NL, the Philadelphia Phillies and San Diego Padres rode euphoric wild card series wins to decisive NLDS victories over a pair of well-rested 100-win clubs, the Los Angeles Dodgers and Atlanta Braves. Is it really good for the Astros that they’ve had three straight off-days while the Yankees get to roll right into the ALCS?
In addition, the Astros worked almost as hard to sweep the Mariners as the Yankees did to escape the Guardians. Verlander got tagged for six runs in four innings in the ALDS opener, when Yordan Alvarez hit a walk-off three-run homer to cap a comeback from a trio of four-run deficits. Alvarez hit a two-run homer to complete a sixth-inning comeback in Game 2 and Game 3 remained scoreless until Jeremy Pena homered for the game’s lone run in the 18th inning.
Nor are these teams separated by that much. The Yankees ranked first in the majors in homers and third in ERA. The Astros ranked fourth and second, respectively. And both teams had 106-56 records per the Pythagorean method at Baseball-Reference, which takes into account run differential.
Like everyone in an office pool continuing to tout the one team he or she has left in the Final Four as evidence of his or her knowledge, we’ll stick with the Astros continuing on a path that’ll result in Dusty Baker finally winning his first World Series as a manager. But it’ll be a lengthy series — one that can certainly end with the Yankees winning one for overlooked underdogs everywhere.
PREDICTION: Astros in 6
ONE FUN PROP BET: Yordan Alvarez most home runs in series (+400)
