Rangers win ALDS Game 1 thanks to Evan Carter's dream October, Bruce Bochy's steady hand

BALTIMORE – Bruce Bochy managed his first World Series game in 1998, an ultimately failed effort by the San Diego Padres against the dynastic New York Yankees.

Four years later, Evan Carter was born.

Saturday, their paths converged in the American League Division Series, the masterful manager and the kid with exactly one month in the big leagues exhibiting both the import of experience and the blissful oblivion of never experiencing failure in a game so humbling.

And that combination is making for a potentially epic autumn for the Texas Rangers.

The Rangers defeated the Baltimore Orioles 3-2 in Game 1 of their ALDS, and while it’s just one win when three are required to advance, and nothing is guaranteed, the importance of their victory can’t be overstated.

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They broke serve. They toppled the Orioles’ ace, Kyle Bradish, while awaiting their own star pitchers’ turns in Games 2 and 3.

And as Carter, 21, continued an improbably perfect start to his postseason career and Bochy, 68, pressed every correct button as if he were back in San Francisco and winning three World Series titles with the Giants, it’s evident that these Rangers have an unlikely and very special brew percolating.

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Carter did not make his major league debut until Sept. 8, but the top prospect soon seized a regular job in the outfield as the Rangers finished a 90-win season, yet disappointedly lost three of four games in Seattle to end the season, relegating them to the wild-card round.

And that’s when Carter introduced himself.

He came into this ALDS off a wild-card series in which he rapped three extra-base hits, drew three walks and reached base in six of eight plate appearances, cinching their two-game sweep of the Tampa Bay Rays with a Game 2 homer.

Saturday, he just kept going.

Carter, known the baseball world over as a patient hitter, ripped a first-pitch RBI double off Bradish, scoring Adolis García with the game’s first run in the fourth inning. It was 2-0 when Carter scampered home on Jonah Heim’s RBI single.

Carter drew two more walks and has reached base in nine of his 11 postseason plate appearances. He has double the extra-base hits (four) than outs made (two). He’s the youngest player in playoff history with four extra-base hits in his first three career games.  

He has climbed from ninth to fifth in the Rangers order and come November, might be batting third and driving the parade float.

OK, that’s a bit premature.

But the big league season is a grind. In deeds, mostly and words, Carter has undeniably delivered an energy jolt to a Rangers team whose lackluster finish cast their postseason hopes in doubt.

“It’s just the smile on his face when he goes out there every day. He’s just so happy,” says Rangers general manager Chris Young. “It reminds you why you do this.

“It reminds me why you love the game.”

Though he wears a poker face from first out to last, and scarcely budges from the dugout, Bochy does the same.

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This was the game Texas wasn’t supposed to win. Baltimore was rested and had Bradish, third in the AL with a 2.83 ERA this season, atop the hill. Their pitching heroes in Tampa Bay, lefty Jordan Montgomery and right-hander Nathan Eovaldi, would not be available until Games 2 and 3.

Game 1, then, would be a dreaded “piggyback” game, with lefty Andrew Heaney giving them as many outs as they can, and right-hander Dane Dunning to follow, hoping to zap the Orioles’ bench with early platoon changes.

Heaney procured 11 outs – leaving 16 for his teammates.

“As far as Skip goes,” Carter says of his manager with 2,093 career wins, “that's definitely somebody you love with all the experience, to be able to look to him, and he's leading the ship.”

Yet the crew on that ship looks far different than his three-time champs in San Francisco – especially in the bullpen.

When the center field gate swung open, Brian Wilson would not be running through that door. Nor Sergio Romo, nor trusted lefty Jeremy Affeldt, perhaps the greatest reliever in modern postseason history (Mariano Rivera fans, you can look it up).

No, it would be Dunning and veteran lefty Will Smith (4.40 ERA) and Josh Sborz (5.50 ERA) and 35-year-old Aroldis Chapman trying to get the ball to Jose Leclerc, who blew more games (five) than he saved this year (four) and, well, let’s just say he heard almost every voice of the 46,450 in attendance at Camden Yards.

“You know what? I was nervous,” Leclerc said. “A hundred percent. First time with that many fans in the stadium.

“But when I got in the game I said, let’s do it. Let’s try to get three outs.”

It was what Bochy asked of all his guys. And let’s just say his bedside manner is as good as it was when he was in San Francisco, with a stable of proven firemen.

“I think he has a good pulse for his guys,” says Heaney, who started 28 games this year and relieved in six others, “how his guys are feeling, even how confident they are in their stuff, what they do well, factoring in matchups and thinking innings ahead, trying to figure out how to finish games, win games.

“Once those guys got settled in, they showed how great their stuff is. Getting swings and misses, getting double plays. That’s how you do it – keep traffic off the bases, go out and trust your stuff.”

Not that it wasn’t scary. Chapman walked the first two batters of the eighth – the most cardinal of baseball sins – yet induced a 5-4-3 double play from Anthony Santander and struck out Ryan Mountcastle to end the threat.

Leclerc gave up a ringing single to Gunnar Henderson to start the ninth – but Heim cut down Henderson trying to steal second.

Sborz, too, got in on the high-wire act, issuing a leadoff walk in the seventh before striking out Cedric Mullins (on an 87-mph curveball) and Ryan O’Hearn (fastball, 99) to end that threat.

Whew.

“You learn just not to think when you’re going in,” says Sborz. “You think you know when you’re going in and he throws a curveball. I thought Will Smith was going back in in the seventh with all the lefties coming up. Sure enough, it was me.

“You’re always ready. You know Boch knows what he’s doing. You already have trust. Mad Dog (pitching coach Mike Maddux) knows what he’s doing. You have trust with these guys because they’re so experienced.”

Said Heim of Bochy: “Stoic. Nothing ever gets him too up or too down until that last out’s made. There’s never any panic. And he knows what buttons to push at the time.”

The Rangers know plenty about improvising after best-laid plans go awry.

Jacob deGrom was on hand Saturday, but simply spectating after undergoing Tommy John surgery three months into his $185 million contract. Max Scherzer, the future Hall of Famer acquired in August to replace him, did his only damage Saturday on a massive batch of lobsters brought in for a postgame feast; he may return for a possible ALCS appearance.

So Boch, did your best-laid plans work out?

“Pretty much. Pretty much,” he said. “We're down a couple starters. So you've got to get creative and it worked out well today.

“I can't say quite scripted, but pretty close to it.”

Game 1 certainly wasn’t scripted, because you can’t make up what Carter’s doing. Someday, perhaps soon, he’ll wake up. For now, it’s a nice little October dream these Rangers – 3-0, all on the road this postseason – hope doesn’t end.

“This is what every kid dreams of,” says Sborz, a Dodger in 2019-20, but pitching in his first postseason. “Being in these moments, having this kind of energy all around you and just pitching.”