The Houston Astros defeated the New York Yankees 4-2 in Game 1 of the American League Championship Series thanks to a dominant performance from pitcher Justin Verlander and home runs from Yuli Gurriel, Chas McCormick and Jeremy Peña.
The triumph went to Verlanderthe loss was awarded to Clarke Schmidt and the save went to closer Ryan Pressly.
Justin Verlander
Justin Verlander dominated the yankees hitters for six full innings. Despite giving up a solo homer to Harrison Bader in the second inning, the two-time Cy Young winner struck out 11 of the 24 New York batters he faced and left with a 1.50 ERA.
Thanks to your performance tonight, Verlander became the all-time leader in strikeouts in major league postseason history by reaching 219.. Additionally, he recorded his eighth playoff game with 10 strikeouts.
Sixth inning home runs
Yuli Gurriel broke the tie in the first turn of the sixth down with a home run to left field. After a groundout by Aledmys Díaz, Chas McCormick followed in Gurriel’s footsteps and hit a home run to the right wall. Both homers counted toward reliever Clarke Schmidt’s record.
Jeremy Pena
rookie jeremy Peña extended the Astros’ lead in the seventh roll with a four-corner stick to the left field.. According to MLB’s Sarah Lang, the Dominican reached three extra-base hits and tied the record for a first-year player held by Carlos Correa, Evan Longoria, Jacob Ellsbury and Jim Gilliam.
Ryan Pressly closing
Ryan Pressly took the mound for the final out of the eighth inning and struck out Matt Carpenter. In the ninth, he recorded strikeouts off Harrison Bader and Isiah Kiner-Falefa before the Astros got the 27th out on a Jose Treviño groundout. The Astros closer only needed 15 pitches to give his team the victory.
strikeout difference
In all, 17 Yankees batters struck out in Game 1 of the ALCS while only two for the Astros suffered that fate. Based on data from Sarah Lang, the 15 differential became the largest in major league postseason history.
The widest strikeout differential before today was 14, achieved in Game 1 of the 1968 World Series when the St. Louis Cardinals’ Bob Gibson struck out 17 and the Detroit Tigers’ Denny McClain three. .