Outside The Confines: Lone Star showdown

I’m going to assume that all of you know that the Rangers took a 1-0 lead in the best-of-seven American League Championship Series with a 2-0 win last night.

• Dayn Perry has a history of the rivalry between the Rangers and Astros, which dates back to before the Rangers were even born as the Astros were able to prevent a team from moving into the Dallas/Ft. Worth area for a decade.
• Evan Drellich calls the Rangers and Astros a “Texas-sized rivalry” that is the best rivalry that you’ve don’t hear much about. (The Athletic sub. req.) He also notes that the rivalry really took off when the Astros moved to the American League.
• Kennedi Landry calls catcher Jonah Heim the “unsung hero” of the Rangers playoff run.
• One of the heroes of Game 1 was rookie outfielder Evan Carter, thanks to his terrific catch and Jose Altuve’s baserunning blunder.
• Jim Callis has the story of how the Rangers selected Carter in the second round of the 2020 draft, despite not appearing on any Top 100, 250 or 500 draft prospect lists that year.
• Brian McTaggart reports that the Astros are not panicking after their Game 1 loss.
• The Rangers got a boost as pitchers Max Scherzer and Jon Gray were added to the ALCS roster after they recovered from injuries.
• The Rangers improved to 6-0 this postseason. Manny Randhawa looks at the longest unbeaten streaks to start a postseason and where the Rangers currently stand.
• Sarah Langs looks at ten facts and figures behind the historic managerial matchup between the Rangers’ Bruce Bochy and the Astros’ Dusty Baker.
• There’s an interesting manager matchup in the National League Championship Series as well, as the Diamondbacks’ Torey Lovullo and the Phillies’ Rob Thompson were minor league teammates on the 1987 Class A Lakeland Tigers.
• Paul Casella has three keys to the NLCS.
• Steve Gilbert traces how the Diamondbacks went from losing 110 games in 2021 to reaching the NLCS in 2023.
• Steve Gilbert profiles D-Backs phenom Corbin Carroll.
• Todd Zolecki looks at how Phillies shortstop Trea Turner turned his season around.
• Theo DeRosa writes that the four LCS teams have been dominating this postseason.
• Alex Eisert examines why pitching is so much better in the postseason.
• Commissioner Rob Manfred asks for patience from those who think the playoffs need to change because the higher-seed teams didn’t win this year.
• Bob Nightengale writes that the 100-win teams in the playoffs lost because they all had major flaws that were exposed in the playoffs.
• Zach Kram agrees that the losing teams’ problems were more about flaws in their teams, not flaws in the playoff system. Except he uses more data than Nightengale does.
• Jayson Stark tells people to stop blaming the playoff system. (The Athletic sub. req.) Stark points out that the Astros have no problem succeeding with the current playoff system.
• Stephanie Apstein points out that the Phillies put away the Braves with pitching, which seems unusual for them.
• TV ratings for the playoffs are down this year. I suspect this has more to do with the teams involved than anything else, but what do I know?
• Andrew Baggarly reports that Alyssa Nakken interviewed for the vacant Giants managerial job, (The Athletic sub. req.) making her the first woman to be an official candidate for a managerial job. (Non-paywalled story here.)
• Ben Clemens hands out a report card to Orioles manager Brandon Hyde.
• Braves president Alex Anthopoulos talked about what the Braves need to do to rebound next year. Mark Bowman reports.
• Time for the butcher’s bill. Braves pitcher Kyle Wright had shoulder surgery and is expected to miss all of 2024.
• Brewers pitcher Brandon Woodruff also had shoulder surgery and could miss all of next year.
• And finally, Daniel Brown speaks with retired infielder Matt Kata, the only player in history who played for the Diamondbacks, Phillies, Rangers and Astros. (The Athletic sub. req.) And yes, he plays Immaculate Grid and unfortunately, his rarity score is likely to get worse now that his secret is out.

And tomorrow will be a better day than today, Buster.