Astros one win from historic World Series title
Credit to Author: Agence France-Presse| Date: Tue, 29 Oct 2019 16:13:20 +0000
HOUSTON: On the verge of a historic World Series fightback, the Houston Astros returned home on Monday (Tuesday in Manila) planning to lean on resilience and experience to capture a second title in three seasons.
The Astros own a 3-2 lead in Major League Baseball’s best-of-seven final and if they beat Washington in game six Tuesday they will become only the fourth team to take the crown after dropping the first two games at home.
“We took a pretty heavy punch in the gut when it came to the first two games,” Astros manager A.J. Hinch said.
“We know how quickly momentum can shift. We’re not going to take anything for granted, but our confidence level is good.”
It should be after three wins in Washington where the Nationals hit only .175 and scored just once in each game. But Washington defied the odds all season just to get this far after a 19-31 start to the campaign.
“The guys feel good. They’re all upbeat,” Nationals manager Dave Martinez said. “This is way far from over.”
The Astros won an MLB-best 107 games in the regular season, then needed a one-game winner-take-all victory over Tampa Bay to advance and then bounced back from losing an American League final opener against the New York Yankees.
“Resiliency,” Hinch said. “This is not a magic carpet ride of a season. We’ve been successful. We had a lot of wins. But there’s still been this sense of we have to keep proving it. And that’s resiliency.”
Astros pitcher Gerrit Cole, the MLB season strikeout leader, used the same term to sum up the Astros’ year.
Not since the 1996 New York Yankees rallied to beat Atlanta has a club overcome losing the first two at home to capture the title.
AFP