Tag: Houston Astros

On-field video showed the Astros’ stadium clearing out before Adolis Garcia even completed his HR trot

They booed him one second. Then, they were heading for the exits.

It has been quite the series for Texas Rangers slugger Adolis Garcia, and on Sunday, he got to experience what it was like to send an entire stadium to the parking lots.

Garcia — whose home run in Game 5 led to a benches-clearing incident and ejection — was back in the lineup for Game 6 of the ALCS in Houston. With the Rangers already up three runs in the ninth inning, Garcia shut down any hope the Astros had when he launched a grand slam into the Crawford Boxes.

At that point, every fan at Minute Maid Park knew that the series was heading into a Game 7. And they didn’t feel the need to stick around long enough to see Garcia complete his home run trot.

We could see that in an excellent video from the Rangers:

By the time Garcia got back to home plate, the aisles were full of fans heading to the exits.

Fans also loved that video. It captured the Astros’ defeated mood perfectly at that moment.

The Rangers – Astros brawl after Adolis Garcia was hit by pitch in 6 photos

A look at the brawl from Game 5.

Looking back, Adolis Garcia should have known the pitch that hit him after he slowly celebrated his game-changing home run wasn’t on purpose.

But it’s the pitch that changed Game 5 of the 2023 ALCS.

It sparked a brawl that saw Garcia, pitcher Bryan Abreu and Houston Astros manager Dusty Baker ejected. Then? Jose Altuve hit the game-winning dinger, and Baker ended up celebrating at the Astros’ tunnel. A wild game and series of events.

As we get set to move on to see if the Astros can close out the Texas Rangers, here’s a look back at photos from the brawl.

The ejected Dusty Baker peeked out to celebrate Astros’ Game 5 win and everyone made jokes

Dusty had to come back to see his team win.

Dusty Baker wasn’t around in the dugout to watch the dramatic end of the 2023 ALCS Game 5 that included a hit by pitch on Adolis Garcia (why Baker was ejected, although should he have been?) and then Jose Altuve’s game-winning home run in the ninth.

But as soon as the final out came, there was Baker, peeking in from the tunnel, celebrating the win. It was delightful and of course everyone thought about Bobby Valentine, the former Mets manager who came back to the dugout in disguise after being ejected in 1999.

Here are a few jokes made after the huge playoff victory:

 

 

Hear the epic radio call of Jose Altuve’s Game 5-winning home run: ‘Clear eyes and a full heart!’

What a home run, what a call.

Of course it was Jose Altuve.

One of baseball’s all-time best postseason players stepped up to the plate in the ninth inning with his Houston Astros down three runs after Adolis Garcia’s home run and the bench-clearing fracas that resulted after Garcia was later hit by a pitch.

And with two men on, Altuve smacked a three-run home run that would prove to be the game-winner in Game 5 of the ALCS — the Texas Rangers are now one contest away from elimination.

The radio call from the Astros’ radio booth of Robert Ford and Steve Sparks is epic, with a “HOW DO YOU LIKE THAT?” and an additional call of, “Clear eyes and full heart!”

So good:

Adolis Garcia angrily confronts catcher Martin Maldonado, not the pitcher, in bench-clearing melee after hit by pitch

Was the pitch thrown at Adolis Garcia on purpose after he celebrated a huge home run?

You don’t always see this when there’s a slugger hit by a pitch after he celebrates a home run.

But there Adolis Garcia was, after hitting a go-ahead three-run shot earlier in Game 5 of the ALCS, confronting Houston Astros catcher Martin Maldonado instead of the Bryan Abreu, the pitcher who threw the ball at him.

Let’s rewind for a sec. It was right after that home run that Garcia took a slow walk down to first, celebrating, which is totally fine and should NOT be punished.

But was the subsequent pitch that hit him intentional? There was a man on first and the Astros were down 4-2 at the time. So you could say it wasn’t the time to throw a purpose pitch (although as I said above, that should never happen after home run celebrations).

Garcia then went after Maldonado and was ejected, along with Abreu and Houston manager Duty Baker:

Umpire cam shows how scary a fastball up and in on Jose Altuve can be

LOOK OUT!

We’ve seen so many things thanks to the innovation known as Umpire Cam (literally, a camera on the head of an umpire in both MLB and college baseball): A hit-by-pitch, what a Freddie Freeman home run looks like up close, and how darn hard it is to hit a Spencer Strider fastball.

This time? It’s how scary an up and in pitch for some so-called “chin music” can be.

This came out of Game 4 of the ALCS between the Texas Rangers and Houston Astros, with a pitch that had Jose Altuve jerking his head back and then falling to the dirt.

Yikes!

There was also Corey Seager’s home run with ump cam, much less frightening:

Marcus Semien got tagged on the batting glove in his pocket for a wild ALCS out

What a weird play.

Whoever said that baseball — or maybe it was football? Whatever! — is a game of inches must have been predicting this play from the Houston Astros Game 4 ALCS win over the Texas Rangers.

With Marcus Semien on first, Corey Seager hit a ball right to Jose Abreu, who then tagged Semien for a possible double play. The Astros challenged … and the replay showed that Abreu’s glove nailed Semien on his batting glove. The catch? The glove was hanging out of his back pocket!

Seriously, that’s wild. You can see it move as Abreu’s glove grazes it. The GIF below is so cool:

The Rangers’ Adolis Garcia hilariously broke out a cartwheel after trying to avoid an inside pitch

Playoff baseball is getting weird.

The Texas Rangers came storming out of the gates in Monday’s Game 2 of the ALCS, scoring four runs in the first inning off Astros pitcher Framber Valdez. But the best highlight for the Rangers didn’t even result in a run.

With Adolis Garcia batting in the second inning against Valdez, a 2-2 cutter inside by the feet had Garcia jumping to avoid the pitch and then smoothly going into a cartwheel on the opposite side of the plate. And while it initially appeared that Garcia had avoided the pitch, it was ruled a hit by pitch and he took first base.

But let’s be honest: We won’t see a better athletic display on a hit by pitch … ever?

I mean, that was so smooth. He did a cartwheel, landed and seamlessly started his stroll to first base.

That’s how you know you’re playing on a different level when even the hit by pitches look cool.

Astros Oxy uniform patch: What is it and why does Houston wear it?

Here’s the deal with that Houston Astros uniform patch everyone is talking about.

You may be watching the Houston Astros in the 2023 MLB playoffs and suddenly, it hits you: There’s a uniform patch on their threads that says OXY.

And you’re now wondering: What the heck is Oxy and why would the Astros wear that on their sleeves?

There’s a very good answer to that. Oxy is not what you think it is. Oxy is actually short for Occidental Petroleum, an energy company who has its headquarters in — you guessed it — Houston.

Oxy is an official jersey partner of the Astros for the next seven years thanks to a deal signed back in February.

And now you have the answer!

MLB fans all made the same ‘Atta boy Altuve’ joke after Jose Altuve’s base-running blunder

The “Atta boy” jokes were everywhere.

It feels like any base-running error the rest of the 2023 MLB playoffs will result in an “ATTA BOY” joke after the weird “controversy” involving Bryce Harper and Orlando Arcia from the NLDS.

That’s what we got when, in the eighth inning of the 2023 ALCS between the Texas Rangers and Houston Astros, we saw Jose Altuve get doubled off of second when Evan Carter caught a ball hit a LONG way by Alex Bregman that was so close to being the game-tying homer.

Instead, Carter caught it and threw to second, where the Rangers tagged the base and argued that Altuve hadn’t touched it on his way back to first.

A replay revealed that was the case, and the “Atta boy Altuve” jokes were everywhere: