True or false? Astros heads to another season of 100 wins

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Well, that was not very kind of Houston Astros.

The Seattle Mariners have returned home after a road trip as the most popular baseball team with a 13-2 record, crushing their home goals as a League of Nations softball team. beer and creating a craze around the sport as the first surprise team of 2019.

Then it happened:

Friday: Jose Altuve and Yuli Gurriel hit the big slams while the Astros beat 16 hits in catching a 3-0 deficit to win 10-6.

Saturday: Felix Hernandez gave the Mariners a good start, but Justin Verlander opened the scoring 11 in six innings and Altuve earned a third consecutive victory for his fifth consecutive victory.

Sunday: Gerrit Cole equaled Verlander with 11 K in six innings, the pen threw three unseeded innings, and Aledmys Diaz scored the decisive goal in the seventh inning for a 3-2 win.

These are just the first three of the 19 games played between the teams, but in case you start buying some of the Mariners mojo, the Astros have warned the Pacific Northwest that they are still the bosses of the AL West. The three main points to remember from the series are quite obvious:

• The Astros have Verlander and Cole and the Mariners do not have any.

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• The Astros turned to relievers Brad Peacock, Hector Rondon, Ryan Pressly and Roberto Osuna to secure key outs and finish the games. The Mariners turned to unknown names such as Shawn Armstrong (making his debut this season), R.J. Alaniz (making his Major League debut) and Brandon Brennan (a rookie choice under Rule 5).

• Altuve looks healthy and is stuck again after the knee injury which has limited production in the last stretch last season.

The Astros have won nine straight wins – beating .314 with a .932 score during the series – and what is impressive is that the match was not conducted against the players of background of AL Central, but against A, Yankees and Mariners. The road to a third consecutive 100 season has begun.

Marquez clears the Rockies from the bunker: It was a nightmare start for the Rockies. They came in Sunday with a series of eight defeats, including a loss of 18 innings against the Giants on Friday. They had been excluded three times in 15 games while they had reached .203. Nolan Arenado had not returned yet. Ian Desmond had hit 56 times without scoring a goal.

So, yes, they needed the gem of German Marquez to beat the Giants 4-0. Marquez's qualified for the eighth goal – the perfect match was marred when he hit Kevin Pillar in front of the sixth goal – and he only threw 76 shots. The number of throws was not the problem. offer these days. Brandon Crawford led eighth and failed third with the ball over Arenado and in the air, where he grabbed it and threw Crawford. With a bit of luck like that, the last five outs were a sure thing.

Instead, Evan Longoria, the next batter, hit a base goal in front of a diving Arenado, who threw his glove in disgust after not playing what would have been a miracle game. Marquez got the last five outs and even though he missed the second draw in the history of the Rockies (Ubaldo Jimenez launched one in 2010), he recorded the first full match in major this season. His score was the second best game in Rocky history:

Jon Gray, September 17, 2016 vs Padres: 95
Marquez, April 14, 2019, vs Giants: 94
Jeff Francis, July 24, 2006, vs Cardinals: 91
Darryl Kile, September 20, 1998 vs Padres: 91
Chad Bettis, September 5, 2016, against the giants: 90

Jimenez walked six years and missed seven in a draw, scoring 88.

Make no mistake: Marquez has become one of the best throwers of the major leagues. To return to last year's All-Star Game, he is 8-4 with a 2.48 ERA and 149 strikeouts in 120 innings. During this period, he ranks sixth in ERA, the first in innings, the third in the playoff and tied with Jacob deGrom for first place in quality.

P.S: Arenado finally hit his first homerun.

Anderson launches a t-shirt: Great weekend for the White Sox, two wins out of three at Yankee Stadium – and the first time since 2003 that they won two consecutive series at Yankee Stadium. On Friday, Eloy Jimenez hit the first two circuits of his career and Tim Anderson made the big move in Sunday's 5-2 win with a grand slam in the fourth inning against Masahiro Tanaka:

Anderson is a key player in the White Sox if this ongoing rebuild is to work. He hit 20 homers and swept 26 goals last season, but a wrong approach to the plate canceled out those positives and led to an average of .240, .281 and 150 OBP recessed. Anderson's hunting rate last season was 38%, one of the highest of the majors. indeed, the pitchers knew that he was going to leave, so less than half of the throws he saw were in the strike zone.

That's why the 0-1 pitch of Tanaka was particularly terrible – a 0-1 splitter that did not crack. Obviously, he wanted it in the mud, hoping that Anderson would swing over it. Powered by a .500 BABIP, Anderson is a great start with a .429 / .440 / .653 lineup, but with the same high pursuit rate and an aggressive approach, so do not expect that. that the sharp improvement of its 2018 figures persists.

In the case of the Yankees, Brian Cashman and Aaron Boone did not envision the spring training roster: Clint Frazier at DH, Brett Gardner at center, Gio Urshela at third, Kyle Higashioka at catcher and Mike Tauchman at left . The Yankees' depth was tested early, and although it's easy to blame the injured for the 6-9 start, the marker is 4-4 and entered Sunday in 25th place in the added victory probability. In addition, the entries J.A. Happ and James Paxton leave slowly. It's worth noting that they've had an easy schedule so far, aside from three games in Houston (they've lost all three), with six games against the Orioles. They will have a test this week with their first two games against the Red Sox.

Practice: The Phillies defeated the Marlins 3-1 at Jean Segura's home race in the 14th inning:

Great job from the Phillies, who pitched seven baseball innings with three shots with 14 strikeouts, including six from Victor Arano, who fanned all the batters he faced.

Fly like an eagle: Byron Buxton did magic in the middle of the field when the Twins defeated the 6-4 Tigers:

Buxton started well on the plate, reaching 0.324 / .378 / .559. He did not dominate, but he has six doubles and one triple in 34, so he does good things with the bat. At this point, it almost seems like any offense on the part of Buxton will be a bonus, but his second semester in 2017 will still serve as a teaser of what he could do to the plate. I still think he's one of the most important players in the league, a potential 5-WAR player if he can stay healthy and cause damage to the plate. Happy to see him leave positively after a loss of 2018.

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