ALCS
ALCS: Yankees Beat Astros 5-0, One Win From Fall Classic
Once an unlikely scenario, Yanks on Brink of ALCS Title.
The New York Yankees are one win away from advancing to the 2017 World Series, which would be their first appearance since the 2009 season when they won their 27th Title.
On Wednesday night in the Bronx, the Yankees and Astros sent their Game 1 starters back to the mound with each team looking for a Game 5 edge. But the Yankees, who have yet to lose a game in the postseason at home, weren’t about to relinquish the current streak.
After a scoreless inning and a half, the Yankees struck first on an RBI single from Greg Bird scoring Starlin Castro to put New York up 1-0.
In the bottom of the third, they added another run on an RBI double from hot hitting Aaron Judge, plating Brett Gardner with the third run of the game.
The Yankees were not done as they added two in the fifth on RBI singles from Gary Sanchez and Didi Gregorius and a run in the seventh on Sanchez’s first home run of the series and third of the 2017 postseason.
On the mound Tanaka was better than his Game 1 performance where he tossed six innings, allowing two runs on four hits, a walk and three strikeouts. In Game 5, Tanaka was everything that Yankees needed and more as he pitched seven shutout innings, allowing just three hits, one walk and struck out eight batters.
For the ‘Stros, Keuchel was a polar opposite of his Game 1 performance where he stifled the Yankee bats, but in Game 5, Keuchel was brought back to earth as the Yankees knocked him out of the game after just 4.2 innings, where he allowed four runs on seven hit, and a walk, but still managed to strike out eight batters in his short time on the mound.
Once again for the third straight game, the Yankees pitching staff quieted the Astros offense as the Bronx Bombers have outscored Houston on New York 19-5 so far in the series.
Can the Astros wake up in time to force a Game 7, or will the Yankees continue their recent surge and advance to the World Series? Game 6 can’t come any quicker.
