Houston Astros rocket to 2-1 ALDS advantage

HOUSTON -- Bonding rituals can help a team survive the travails of a long season, and the Houston Astros know the drill. Sometime in May, outfielder George Springer introduced a routine called "Club Astros" to the postgame mix, replete with a disco ball, strobe lights and a fog machine. If the Bee Gees were available for a reunion, Springer probably would have invited them to the party, too.

After the Astros beat the Kansas City Royals 4-2 in game three of the American League Division Series on Sunday, the usual gray, curtain-like haze permeated the Houston clubhouse.

By the time the fog cleared, the realization had set in: One more win, and the Astros will be playing for an American League pennant.

Staff ace Dallas Keuchel pitched seven strong innings, and the Astros relied on a smorgasbord of offensive contributors to take a 2-1 lead in the best-of-five series. When rookie Lance McCullers takes the mound against Yordano Ventura in a Monday matinee at Minute Maid Park, he'll try to bring the Astros within four wins of their first World Series appearance since 2005.

It's a head-spinning turn of events for a Houston franchise that logged an average record of 54-108 from 2011 through 2013. The Astros showed their mettle by winning four of six games on a season-ending road trip to clinch a wild-card berth, then traveled to New York and beat the Yankees to advance. Now they're nine innings away from knocking off a Kansas City club that led the AL with 95 wins and won the AL Central by 12 games.

Houston and the surrounding environs are, understandably, gripped by baseball fever. Former President George H.W. Bush, recovering from a broken vertebra in his neck, threw out the ceremonial first pitch from a wheelchair, and Astros executive advisor Nolan Ryan was one of 42,674 orange-clad partisans rejoicing in the victory. He might have been the only person in attendance who wasn't banging ThunderStix.

With the roof closed at Minute Maid Park, the decibel level was reminiscent of what the Toronto Blue Jays, Seattle Mariners, Minnesota Twins and other dome teams enjoyed in their heydays.

How loud was it after catcher Jason Castro grounded a two-run single to center to give Houston a 2-1 lead in the fifth?

"It's a constant tone," Astros closer Luke Gregerson said. "There's really no differentiation between the ThunderStix and the cheering or anything like that. It's just one solid sound of noise that echoes off the walls and off the ceiling. It's loud."

And how emotionally in tune were the fans, with their matching Astros T-shirts and plastic bangers?

"Unbelievable," outfielder Carlos Gomez said. "It looked like an orange everywhere. I wanted to eat it."

No single player seemingly benefits more from the crowd support than Keuchel, who parlayed a 15-0 regular-season record and a 1.46 ERA at home into an All-Star start and a major presence in the AL Cy Young debate. Truth be told, Keuchel has no idea why he was so dominant in Houston this season, and no reason to think that mastery or those pronounced home-road splits will extend into 2016.

He has pretty much tapped out in trying to analyze the situation. But he sure appreciates all those fannies in the seats.

"You never want to lose in any situation," Keuchel said. "Guys hate losing. But I think it was a good 10 years because the stadium was absolutely rocking, and it's been building all year. We knew that it was going to be pretty nuts today, and we fully expect it to be nuts tomorrow. It's one of the best feelings in the world to have so many people behind you clapping, yelling and having your back."

After allowing only four homers in 129 regular-season innings at home, Keuchel relinquished a solo blast to Lorenzo Cain in the fourth inning Sunday. Then he went into lockdown mode, pitching in and out of various degrees of trouble before departing in the seventh. Manager A.J. Hinch, showing the requisite sense of urgency, summoned Gregerson with two outs in the eighth inning for his first four-out save all season.

Game 3 featured an array of contributors who benefited from Hinch's faith in them this summer. Castro, the longest-tenured member of the Astros, hit .146 (6-for-41) after his return from a quadriceps injury in mid-September and was nobody's pick to click. And first baseman Chris Carter, who led the way with a single, double and a homer, is the same guy a lot of fans wanted to see released after he hit below .200 for four of the first five months of the regular season.

Then there was Carlos Gomez, who continues to plug away through the discomfort caused by an intercostal strain. Hinch inserted him in the lineup in center field, and Gomez responded with an RBI single and a fine running catch on an Alex Rios shot in the ninth inning.

"We don't care about how old you are,'' Hinch said. "We don't care about your experience level. We don't care what you've done in the past. We care about what you're going to do tonight. And we had a lot of guys step up tonight."

Hinch has pushed a lot of the right buttons against the Yankees and Royals over the past week. After Sunday's game, while the Houston players were disco-dancing, he received a few words of praise and a congratulatory handshake from Astros owner Jim Crane.

"I just told him, 'This is the best crowd I've seen in 10 years here,'" Crane said. "I've been coming to games here a long time -- long before we owned the team. So it's really fun to see everybody back into it."

When the Astros return to work Monday, Minute Maid Park will feature more noise, more orange, more energetic baseball and, they hope, more fog. Houston fans have waited a long time to invest this emotionally in a team. They're enjoying the experience to the max.