Red Sox vs Astros forecast, overview: MLB playoff schedule, support, live stream, TV and more

Saturday, the best league series of the American League 2018 will begin, and it seems that it is something special. On one side, you have the reigning Houston Astros champion and in front of him, the 108 wins of the Boston Red Sox. Now let's move on to what you need to know about what could be a classic ALCS:

The LCS games will be broadcast on Fox, FS1 and TBS, which can be streamed on fuboTV (Free Trial). To view the full program, click here.

ALCS Calendar, support

Saturday, October 13	8 pm ET	Houston to Boston	TBS
Sun 14th of October	7 pm ET	Houston to Boston	TBS
Tuesday October 16th	To come up	Boston to Houston	TBS
Wed 17 October	To come up	Boston to Houston	TBS
Thursday 18th October *	To come up	Boston to Houston	TBS
Saturday, October 20th *	To come up	Houston to Boston	TBS
Sun 21 October *	To come up	Houston to Boston	TBS

* – if necessary

It's a real shock of titans

The Astros – belt and title owners – have won 103 regular season games, which is more than what they won in the 2017 championship season. On the other hand, the Reds Sox have won 108 games, the highest record since 2001, the Mariners broke a record of 116. Combined, the Astros and Red Sox outperformed their opponents in the regular season by 492 points. In the ALDS, they outclassed their opponents by 28 points overall. You had the idea.

There is also this:

The 1998 world championships featured the Yankees at 114 wins against the Padres at 98 wins. The Yankees were doing most of the work for their total victories. On the base, you can state that it is the most impressive match. This is also, implicitly, the highest total of combined wins of all time among LCS opponents.

It's a match of strengths

During the regular season, the Astros did not just lead the league in race prevention, they dominated the category. Houston has allowed 534 races this season, which is only 3.3 races per game. The Dodgers are in second place and of course play in the league without DH, with 610 points allowed. To repeat: the Astros have completely dominated this category. This is thanks to the mixed approach. This season, they led the major leagues in ERA rotation and FIP rotation, which could be expected given their starter pitcher team. The Astros, however, also led the majors in the ERA sector and the FIP to the concealer. Add to all this the fact that the Astros also ranked fourth in the defensive efficiency majors, which is the percentage of hit balls that a defense converts into outs. In simple terms, the Astros have excelled in all areas of race prevention.

And that brings us to their opponents. The 2018 Red Sox in the regular season led the majors in points scored, batting average, base percentage and slugging percentage, and they placed in the unusual third place of the MLB on stolen bases. Yes, Fenway Park does a bit of work in these numbers, but note that the Red Sox ranked fourth in the MLB in points scored on the road and fifth in OPS on the road. They can strike anywhere.

The Astros (barely) took the season series

These two squadrons met seven times in the regular season and Houston won four out of seven, beating Boston 34 to 31 in the process. The Astros were at home for four of those games. Basically, it's a nudge.

Also do not forget that the Astros eliminated the Red Sox last year by beating 3 to 1 in the ALDS. Of course, key figures such as J.D. Martinez, Gerrit Cole, Roberto Osuna, Nathan Eovaldi, Steve Pearce and Ian Kinsler were not involved in this case.

Speed ​​of sale is back

One of the big questions for Boston before the playoffs was whether ace, Chris Sale, would be able to recover the speed that he had leaked during his last outings of the regular season. Given his past end-of-season problems and the fact that he had an inflammation of the shoulder this year, it's not an exaggeration to say that Sox's fate in post-season might depending on whether Sale is vintage or not.

Talking about that …

BrooksBaseball.net

The last two points are Sale's departure against the Yankees in the first match of ALDS and his relief appearance in the fourth game. In his last regular season start, he had fallen to 90 mph with his fastball, which is troubling. The Sox attributed it to a minor mechanical flaw rather than a health problem, and the rebound in the playoffs seems to confirm it. In the first game against New York, he was at 94.8 mph on average and out of play in the fourth game he was 95.5 (no wonder he sees a spike in relief ). True, he did not reach his peak from June to August, while he was sitting 97-98, but it should be noted that in the past, Peak Sale had reached 95 years old. His jump in 2018 at mid-season was an exception. Dirty is perfectly capable of dominating with a heater at 94-95 mph.

Still, the Astros think they have a big advantage in pitching

Assuming things go as planned, here's how pitching matches should unfold:

There is a bit of doubt here, especially with regard to the Houston 4 game starter (it could be Morton, could be McCullers, could be a "piggyback" situation, could be even more unexpected). In addition, we found that Alex Cora was willing to use embossed runners, which could result in some rotation, as in the ALDS vs. New York.

In terms of price, Houston is much better and much better settled. Astros manager A.J. Hinch has recently relied on Ryan Pressly, Lance McCullers Jr. and Roberto Osuna as head lifters, along with Collin McHugh, Josh James and Tony Sipp also available to him. In addition, during the regular season, only starting pitchers from Cleveland tended to go further than Houston, so Hinch thought he had less navigation in front of him than most skippers.

Meanwhile, Cora has Matt Barnes and Ryan Brasier among his favorites. Joe Kelly of course has the big fast ball, but he is fighting with consistency. Craig Kimbrel remains a close close, but it should be noted that he's badly beaten in the ALDS. In addition, if Cora needs length at any time, he will not have Steven Wright, who has been removed from the ALDS list and is therefore not eligible for the ALCS. Again, Cora may have to be creative to get a track from her to Kimbrel.

Overall, launching on all fronts should favor Houston.

Yes, Price is able to play well in the playoffs

The veteran southpaw is currently trailing around 5.98 EAR in the playoffs, and he's been even worse than that since the start of his playoffs. The recent struggles of October are such that Price Yankee Stadium fans have booked him the home of a hero at ALDS..

That said, Price has generally played well as a replacement for the playoffs. Let's take a closer look at his series debut:

2014 ALDS Game 3	68	8	5	2	6	2
Game 6 ALCS 2015	59	6 2/3	5	3	8	1
2010 ALDS Game 5	50	6	8	3	6	0
Game 3 ALDS 2011	50	6 2/3	7	3	3	1
ALDS Game 2015 1	50	7	5	5	5	2
2015 ALCS Game 2	50	6 2/3	6	5	8	0
ALDS Game 2010 1	46	6 2/3	9	5	8	0
2018 Game ALDS 2	35	1 2/3	3	3	0	2
2013 ALDS Game 2	34	7	9	7	5	2
ALDS Game 2016 2	29	3 1/3	6	5	3	2

The starts you see above are ranked according to the game score. This is a meticulous measure of Bill James that measures the dominance or absence of a pitcher. launcher at a given start (50 is the average and any element greater than or equal to 90 is an absolute jewel). By game score, the price was average or better in six of his 10 starts in the playoffs. On four occasions, he recorded a quality start and this first start approaching the gem status. On the other side, we have two "Disaster Starts", in which the authorized launcher passes his sleeves for a given start.

There is no doubt that Price, on the whole, was disappointing in the playoffs, but it was not uniformly disappointing. He 's proven to be able to keep his teams in the games and even excel. One simply does not reach the major leagues if one is unable to handle pressure situations. When Price was disappointed in the playoffs, it was a combination of quality opposition, a short-term random game that was so common in baseball, and perhaps because of growing fatigue and health problems. He is however perfectly able to prosper in October.

Astros love left-handed

So, if Boston's spin aligns as expected, the Astros will face a southpaw four times in the first six games of the ALCS (assuming, of course, that goes that far). On this note, some relevant figures:

• The Houston offense this season had a 0.733 OPS against the right-handed pitchers, who ranked ninth in the American League.
• The Houston offense this season had a 0.803 OPS against left-handed pitchers, which led the AL.

The difference is glaring and these figures represent a direct challenge for Sale and Price and even for Eduardo Rodriguez, though he had to get a start of ALCS surprise.

The Red Sox as right-handed

In the same way, the Red Sox, if it was going to go long enough, think about facing five right-handed opponents in the first six games of the ALCS. About that:

• The Boston offense this season had a 0.719 OPS against left-handed pitchers, which placed eighth in the American League.
• The Boston offense this season had a .817 OPS against the right-handed pitchers, which led the AL.

So, in this sense, the Boston range is well established in this series. Of course, there is the question of four of those right-handed departures going to people like Verlander and Cole.

Advantage of the field?

Because of their best record in the regular season, the Red Sox were allowed to hold a potential seventh game, giving them an edge on their home ground for the ALCS. Numbers, immediately:

• The Red Sox this season went on to score a better result in MLB 57-24 at home.
• The Astros of this season have the highest score among the MLB 57-24 in games on the road.

There are risks to read too much in the divisions of a season, even at the team level, but it's a pretty convincing parallel anyway.

SportsLine talked

The SportsLine projection model (@SportsLine on Twitter) has simulated this particular game thousands of times, and here is what came out of the wash:

• The Red Sox win the ALCS 56.5% of the time.
• The Astros win the ALCS in 43.5% of the cases.

Surprised? Yes, the Astros are the champions and have a composition that seems geared to success in the playoffs, but the Red Sox, let's repeat, are the colossus with 108 wins. The SportsLine simulations see the latter consideration to take it away more often than not.

So, who wins each playoff match? And which teams are a must-back? Now head over to SportsLine for MLB playoff selections from the proven model that simulates every game 10,000 times, and find out.

predictions

So what does the CBS Sports MLB collective say about this series? As you are about to see, we primarily support Astros in defiance of what SportsLine tells us.