Jose Altuve on Friday smashed a three-run home run in the ninth inning to deliver defending champions the Houston Astros a dramatic 5-4 comeback victory over the Texas Rangers in the MLB playoffs.
The 33-year-old Venezuelan second baseman, talisman of the Astros’ dynasty run, rallied the visitors after a benches-clearing scuffle in the eighth inning saw two players and Astros manager Dusty Baker ejected.
Altuve blasted his 26th career MLB playoff homer off Rangers closer Jose Leclerc to give Houston a 3-2 lead in the best-of-seven American League Championship Series, moving the Astros within one win of their third consecutive World Series and fifth in seven seasons.
Photo: AFP
“We were really down. We didn’t want to go home down by one ... so it was good to hit that one and get the team to win,” said Altuve, who rated it his best playoff homer.
Also rallying to win were the Arizona Diamondbacks, who edged the Philadelphia Phillies 6-5 to level the National League Championship Series at 2-2.
“It’s an awesome feeling,” said Arizona’s Alek Thomas, who hit a two-run homer. “We’re going to keep doing our thing.”
Photo: AFP
The Astros, who downed Philadelphia in last year’s World Series, have now won 19 of their past 22 road games and seven in a row against Texas.
“That was a huge victory,” Baker said. “This will go down in history.”
Texas outfielder Adolis Garcia crushed a three-run homer in the sixth inning to give the Rangers a 4-2 lead before he was tossed as intense emotions boiled over.
Photo: Joe Camporeale-USA TODAY
Garcia was hit by a pitch from Houston’s Bryan Abreu, sparking a melee that saw both players and Baker ejected.
“It was just the heat of the moment,” Garcia said. “I just reacted to being hit by the pitch ... he could have hurt me.”
Solo homers by Houston’s Alex Bregman and Texas’ Nathaniel Lowe, and Jose Abreu’s run-scoring single in the sixth put Houston ahead 2-1.
Garcia hit his fourth home run of the playoffs off Astros starter Justin Verlander.
Tensions flared in the bottom of the eighth when Abreu hit the 30-year-old Cuban slugger with a fastball and Garcia reacted angrily, confronting Houston players.
“He could have injured me,” Garcia said. “I just let him know that shouldn’t happen there.”
Teammates needed to restrain Garcia after both squads ran from the dugout onto the field.
“I don’t think anybody likes to get hit, especially by a 95 mile per hour [152.8kph] fastball,” Altuve said of Garcia. “He got a little mad, but hopefully it doesn’t go beyond this.”
Umpires ruled that Abreu deliberately hit Garcia with the pitch and ejected him, Garcia and Baker, who argued in vain that the Astros did not want another baserunner.
“I haven’t been that mad in a long time,” Baker said. “I was just seeing red.”
“I know Abreu. I know he’s not trying to hit anybody in a two-run game in the postseason,” Bregman said. “Everyone is amped up because this is what we play for.”
In the ninth, Houston’s Yainer Diaz singled, Jon Singleton walked and Altuve smashed the ball over the left-field wall to plate the winning runs.
“I was just focused on getting one pitch in the middle I could really hit,” Altuve said. “And it happened.”
In Phoenix, Arizona, Philadelphia’s Kyle Schwarber blasted a solo homer in the fourth inning, his 19th career playoff homer and the most by a left-handed batter.
Philadelphia took a 5-2 lead after Johan Rojas tripled and scored on Trea Turner’s sacrifice fly in the seventh inning, but the Diamondbacks pulled level on a bases-loaded walk in the seventh and Thomas’ homer in the eighth.
Arizona’s Ketel Marte singled with two outs in the eighth, advanced on a hit batter and scored the final run on Gabriel Moreno’s single.
Schwarber hit a two-out double in the ninth, but Turner struck out to end the game.
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