In a full night of MLB playoffs with all four division series in play, the Chicago Cubs (beating the St. Louis Cardinals) and the New York Mets (crushing the Los Angeles Dodgers) took 2-1 leads in the NLDS, while in the two ALDS, a Kansas City Royals win over the Houston Astros and victory for the Toronto Blue Jays against the Texas Rangers meant both series are tied at 2-2.
Kansas City Royals beat Houston Astros 9-6, Series tied at 2-2
Down 6-2 and facing elimination, the Kansas City Royals finally found their hitting. A Carlos Correa error led to two scores that tied the game. That was followed with another RBI, this time by Alex Gordon, and the ending came from Eric Hosmer, hitting a 442-feet home run that also brought home Ben Zobrist. The Astros were on the verge of making the ALCS, but things simply fell apart for them in the 8th inning, with the bullpen losing all control of the game.
The blown save and loss goes to Tony Sipp. That’s what the box score says. But it was Will Harris who put the Astros in trouble, coming in for Lance McCullers who did a very good job for 6.2 innings. Correa was doing incredibly well with four hits and four RBIs, including two home runs, but his error sealed the fate of the Astros in a game of seven innings and then a couple more, with the Royals finally finding their bats, and now taking the series to game 5, back at home.
Toronto Blue Jays beat Texas Rangers 8-4, Series tied at 2-2
Another series going to game 5, with the Blue Jays starting strong (7 runs in first three innings) and even more remarkable, David Price getting a playoff win. He came on as relief and delivered three innings that weren’t very good, but the win somehow goes to him, so at least there’s that to be smiling about for Price. R.A. Dickey pitched the first four and two-thirds innings, giving one run and five hits, but the stars were those batting.
Derek Holland got shelled and didn’t even complete three innings. It began with Josh Donaldson and Chris Colabello home runs in the first inning, moved on to a Kevin Pillar home run in the second and in the third inning it was more RBIs for Pillar and Colabello. Pillar finished the game with three RBIs, scoring the final run for the Blue Jays before the Rangers starting getting some hits (off of Price of course) but Aaron Sanchez and Roberto Osuna calmed things down.
Chicago Cubs beat St. Louis Cardinals 8-6, Lead series 2-1
It wasn’t a very good game for Jake Arrieta, something which seemed impossible just last week, but the big hitting the Cubs have been cultivating for the last few years came through big time with six home runs driving the eight runs, with Kyle Schwarber, Starlin Castro, Kris Bryant, Anthony Rizzo, Jorge Soler and Dexter Fowler sharing the scoring between them. Arrieta got the win, but gave up five hits and four runs in less than six innings.
Michael Wacha got bombarded for the Cardinals, but so did anyone else who got on the mound. The Cardinals were able to keep up with the zooming balls into the stands for the first four innings, but Bryant hitting a two-run homer in the fifth busted the game open, and it turned out to be a hit the Cardinals couldn’t recover from. When Fowler hit his homerun to make it 8-4 the stadium exploded, and the Cardinals got in one home run of their own in the ninth, although it didn’t make a difference.
New York Mets beat Los Angeles Dodgers 13-7, Lead series 2-1
For one moment it looked like a bad night for the Mets in Citi Field. A Curtis Granderson error helped the Dodgers take a 3-0 lead in the second inning, but no one was prepared for what came shortly after. The fans packed the stadium in hope of booing Chase Utley, but he stayed back in Los Angeles, despite being eligible to play. It didn’t matter. There was enough fire and sparks coming off the bats as they set a new playoff record for the franchise.
Travis d’Arnaud was the first with an RBI single, but the hit that signaled it was going to be a great day Granderson hitting a three-run double to erase his previous mistake. d’Arnaud hit a homerun and so did Yoenis Cespedes, followed by Granderson hitting another double that scored two players to cap off the Mets’ wonderful day of hitting. The Dodgers didn’t do too badly themselves with the bat, with home runs from Adrian Gonzalez and Howie Kendrick, but they were like sticking fingers in the holes of a bursting dam.