Well it seems a touch fitting that the season would ostensibly come to an end at the hands of the guy who put the Astros in an early hole. Don't get me wrong: Giles has been fantastic as of late but our maxim holds true: Relievers are awesome...until they're not. And it wasn't even all his fault. With a 6-4 lead in the top of the 9th, Giles gave up six runs for a devastating 10-6 loss.
Here's that 9th inning:
-Pennington single
-Escobar two-run homer (6-6)
-Calhoun flyout
-Trout walk
-Pujols intentional walk
-Cron two-run single (8-6)
-Giles wild pitch
-Simmons walk
Feliz relieved Giles
-Buss strikeout
-Ortega three-run double
-Pennington strikeout
Hinch:
Toughest inning of the year, for a lot of reasons. Just a tough loss for this time of year, that fashion. We have six outs and our two primary relievers left. We felt really good about the position we were in, but it will teach you it's never over...That was a gut-wrencher.
*The Astros are now 2.5 GB of the WC2 with the Mariners (2.0 GB) and Orioles (0.5 GB) between them and the Tigers. There are eight games left.
Angels outfielder CJ Cron:
We want to play spoiler. We're not just going to push over and let them take the series. I think you saw that fight in us toward the end of the game today.
*Giles:
I didn't do my job. I put us in a hard position right now, and...I'm going to make up for it.
*The Astros were 73-3 when leading to start the 9th inning. Bad time for that 4th loss. Teams in the Astros position win the game 95.1% of the time, according to FanGraphs. The loss dropped FanGraphs' odds to 5.8% and FiveThirtyEight's playoff odds to 8%.
*Especially given that, in the 9th, Carlos Correa dived for a ball - missed it - and landed directly on the shoulder he had previously injured. Hinch:
If the ball drops and he doesn't dive, I probably feel a little better in my stomach than I do now.
Correa said he would be in the lineup today.
We didn't come out here to play tiddlywinks, son.
-Hal Smith
