Those guys ... again?
It seems like Jose Altuve and Carlos Correa have been posting clutch postseason hits for the Houston Astros for a decade or more.
Or maybe it just feels that way against the Red Sox.
In any event, Houston's dynamic duo — which just played their 68th postseason game in six different trips — was up to their old tricks as they basically carried the Astros offense to a 5-4 victory in Game 1 of the ALCS at Minute Maid Park.
They finished a combined 4 for 7 and knocked in all but one of Houston's runs, two homers and 10 total bases (or, basically, one Kiké Hernandez game).
"Two swings changed the course of the game," said Alex Cora, who had a hand in both players' development with the Astros. "First, slider to Altuve, and then the two-strike changeup to Correa. But I think overall we put good at-bats from the beginning to the end. I think we didn't cash in early on, but I think, yeah, they beat us, and we need to execute better."
Despite walking him to leadoff the game, the Red Sox were effective against Altuve before he walked to the plate with two outs and a runner on in the sixth against Tanner Houck. But the rookie right-hander, armed with a 3-1 lead, hung a slider to a notorious first-ball hitter and he smashed it to left to tie the game.
"Honestly, every time Jose is hitting in the playoffs, I feel like he is going to hit a home run," said Correa. "He is just so dangerous. His track record in the playoffs is insane, and he just inspires me. He inspires me without saying much. ... When you have the best player of your team, that captain, that franchise player that everybody looks up to working that hard, it's just contagious. Everybody else in the organization does the same thing, so I feel like he inspires everybody in that clubhouse every single day."
Altuve said that even though he didn't toss his bat, he was excited about his home run.
He just left the pimping to his running mate.
In the seventh inning, Hansel Robles was handed the ball and charged with retiring the Astros' 3-4-5 hitters. He retired Alex Bregman and Yordan Alvarez, but left a 90 mph changeup at the top of the zone and Correa hit it high and far to left. Even though it was only 345 feet and went about 4 rows back, Correa instantly went into an act where he tapped on his wrist to say, "It's my time."
"It's to my teammates," Correa said. "When the playoffs start, they always tell me it's your time now to go out there, hit homers, this and that. They told me to hit the watch and when I hit the homer -- I did it in Chicago the first time on my own, and today they told me if you hit a homer, hit them with the "it's your time." It just happened naturally there."
That gesture surely going to raise the ire of the Red Sox, who were similarly irked by a Bregman social media post after Houston won Game 1 in 2018, and shut the Astros down the rest of the series.
"I didn't even watch it, to tell you the truth," Dusty Baker said about Correa's act. "I was just thankful for the fact that ball stayed fair and it went out of the ballpark. And I was thinking about how we were going to get some more runs. That's what I was thinking about and the guys that were up after Carlos. So, like I said, I didn't even watch it. I don't know what he did, so I was just kind of numb."
We'll have to see how the Red Sox respond to Correa's antics, but one thing is for certain: they're going to need to find an answer to Astros' double-play combination because, if Game 1 was any indication, they haven't skipped a postseason beat — sort of like a former New England duo, as Baker pointed out.
"I don't know if they're trying to one-up each other, but they're trying to do the best they can every time out there," Baker said. "And I remember (Tommy) Lasorda used to call Billy Russell and Davey Lopes them Frick and Frack. Those guys have been together for a long time. They know each other. It's kind of like Tom Brady and (Rob) Gronkowski. They know how they think. They know probably what they eat for dinner, what they like and what the kids like. It's a special relationship that will last forever because when they get through playing, they'll be coming back to many teams that won in '17 or teams that won here and teams that won there and they're a big part of it.
"I was hoping it would be them ... Those two guys have been -- I've been watching them for years, and it's a pleasure to be watching them up close and personal, and, boy, they are some clutch guys. That was a great game. That was a great game to manage, great game to watch, and I'm just glad that we came out on top."