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The New York Yankees and the Houston Astros will meet in the MLB playoffs. What else is new? It’s happened now four times since 2015. The Astros are 3-0 in those matchups, defeating the Yanks in the 2015 AL Wild Card Game and the 2017 and ‘19 ALCS.
Those two matchups in the League Championship Series have turned this into one of baseball’s better rivalries. That controversial 2017 Houston squad triumphed over the Yankees in a seven-game classic, and then Jose Altuve bashed a series-clinching walk-off homer in Game 6 two years later.
This season, the Astros went 5-2 against the Yankees. New York took the first game of the season series on June 23, 7-6, thanks to a four-run bottom of the ninth at Yankee Stadium. That win moved the Yankees to 52-20 on the season, but Houston took the next two games in the Bronx, including a combined no-hitter on June 25.
That really marked the beginning of the Yankees’ second-half slide as New York would go on to post a 27-34 record over the next couple of months. Houston hosted the Yankees for three games during that stretch and won all three. Granted, their margin of victory in that trio was a combined four runs.
According to DraftKings Sportsbook, the Astros are sizeable favorites in tonight’s Game 1 (-195) and in this series overall (-210).