Astros Will Spoil Cy Young’s Postseason Debut

Tigers vs. Astros, 2:32 ET

Tigers vs. Astros, 2:32 ET

We’ve finally arrived in the baseball postseason and it was quite the journey to get here. I’ve been focused on the idea of the postseason since basically the start of the season. With three Wild Card spots in both leagues, the possibility of the playoffs was much more promising than it was in previous years with just one spot available. Today we are going to lock in on a game between the Tigers and Astros as they open game one of the Wild Card round. 

I’ll start here by giving props to my guy Geoff Clark who took the Tigers to make the playoffs before the season started. While it looked like they wouldn’t get it done for most of the season, they finally snuck in, beating the Twins who just collapsed late in the season. How did the Tigers get here? Going 39-26 in the second half of the year certainly helped. What is most interesting to me is that the Tigers essentially said they were out of the race, trading away players at the deadline. On August 4th, the team wrapped up a series against the Royals and were just 53-60. Which means they went 33-16 to close out their season. The offense at one point was embarrassingly bad, but they finally started connecting the bat to the ball and their strong pitching led them to where they are now. Another ticket and hat tip to Clark here as he recommended and took Tarik Skubal to win the Cy Young. How good was Skubal this year? He had 18 wins, tied for first in the league, a 2.39 ERA, and was second best in the majors, which is the same with his 0.92 WHIP. He also led the league in strikeouts. So basically this guy was within arms reach of a pitching triple crown. He has allowed a total of 20 earned runs in the second half of the season, covering 76 innings. He did face the Astros twice this season, once at home in a quality start, and once in Houston when he allowed four earned runs in 6.1 innings. 

Detroit Tigers LHP Tarik Skubal delivers against the Chicago White Sox at Guaranteed Rate Field. (Matt Marton-USA TODAY Sports)

The Astros also had a very interesting season, but theirs was more like falling off a cliff and climbing back up to the peak. They were 12-24 on May 8th and then finally climbed above .500 on June 30th. Once they were above, they never looked back and continued to reel off wins. If you followed the team early on you could pretty much just attribute the losses to the pitching staff. All season long the Astros were good at putting the bat on the ball and figuring out ways to produce runs. The pitching struggled with both the starting pitchers and the bullpen not providing enough stability. Once the starting rotation figured it out and the bullpen was ironed out, they started winning games. They ended up taking the AL West and are now facing one of the hottest teams in baseball, the Tigers. They send out Framber Valdez to the hill in hopes of going toe-to-toe with Skubal. Valdez put together a very good season at 15-7 with a 2.91 ERA (sixth in the league), and a 1.11 WHIP. From May to August he lowered his ERA each month. September increased a bit, but it went from 1.59 in August to 1.73 in September. He faced Detroit once this season, going seven innings and allowing just two earned runs. Overall, Tiger hitters are 17-for-65 against him. 

The Tigers are kind of playing with house money. Are they going to be nervous coming into this game? I suppose the first time you come into the playoffs there is going to be a bit of anxiety, but the way the Tigers are playing they just need a good start from Skubal. This is a true test for all of the Tigers players. The Astros team has been here and is very familiar with October baseball. I’m going to take the Astros to win this game by more than one run at +154. I think that Skubal might be tagged for some runs here, and I like the Astros to take this opener at home slowing down the momentum of a Tigers. 

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