Gomez, Rasmus power Astros’ offense
Who would have imagined three runs would be enough to get past pyramid baseball-power New York Yankees.
It was actually more than what the Astros needed, as it advanced to the AL Division Series by defeating the Yankees 3-0 in the AL Wild-card game on Tuesday night at Yankee Stadium.
With the win, the Astros will face the Royals in Kansas City on Thursday evening at 6:30 P.M.
Astros (87-76) got home runs from Carlos Gomez and Colby Rasmus. Rasmus parked Masahiro Tanaka’s first pitch of the second inning deep in the right field seats. Gomez homered in the fourth on the first pitch he watched from Tanaka.
“The last two weeks we’ve played in a playoff game,” Gomez said. “Every single day, my guys never gave up.”
“I try to bring as much energy as I could to make everybody feel good,” Rasmus said. “To have the confidence to know we’re going to win a ball game.”
The Yankees threaten, but could never find that clutch hit. Some of that credit goes to the Astros’ defense and Dallas Keuchel, who pitched six scoreless innings, surrendering three hits, and striking out seven.
“I feel like I’ve been the best pitcher all year,” explained Keuchel. “Not just on the team, but in the American League and I wanted that ball.”
Tanaka lasted five innings. Allowing four hits, three walks and two runs.
Although it’s not the Yankees of old, but baseball tradition still lives in New York.
“We can’t be scare coming in playing these guys,” says Rasmus, who was 1-of-3 at the plate. “We had to come in and take it.”
Jose Altuve added a run scoring-single in the seventh off Dellin Betances to give Houston a 3-0 lead that would stand for the one game playoff victory.