Framber Valdez gets Nod Against Lucas Giolito in ALDS Game 2 Showdown.

Gordon Liang

10/8/2021

If you’re a fan of pitching, the league may have screwed you over. The American League Division Series continues on Thursday afternoon and potentially one of the best pitching matchups this October will take place behind the spotlight. The Houston Astros face the Chicago White Sox during the day as the number one seed Tampa Bay Rays will take on the Wild Card winning Boston Red Sox during primetime. Neither the Astros nor the White Sox play on the west coast but if you are a west coast fan trying to witness this duel, you need your alarm clock set as the game begins at 11:07 AM Pacific Time.

Valdez has seen his share of struggles after the foreign substance crackdown and the White Sox were able to exploit them during the regular season. In two starts, he allowed six earned runs and three homeruns in 13.1 innings pitched against the Southside team this year. The key to Valdez’s success since the crackdown has been to utilize his pitches to induce a weak ground ball instead of chasing the strikeout. Before the crackdown, Valdez was turning into a huge strikeout machine but has since learned that the best remaining defense in baseball will pick him up as long as he’s able to produce the ground ball. This is especially crucial for Valdez against the White Sox. The White Sox had the fourth-highest wRC+ against left-handed pitchers in 2021 and coming off a hot end to Thursday’s game, they’ll definitely seek to take advantage of having a southpaw on the mound.

On the flipside, Lucas Giolito will take the bump for the White Sox. Giolito impressed in his outing against the Astros in Chicago this season. He fell an “Abraham Toro homer” short of a shutout outing. Toro is no longer with the Astros so the Astros are certainly hoping to do to Giolito what they’ve been doing to Mariners pitcher Yusei Kikuchi all season. Giolito racked up a very impressive 2021 campaign posting a solid 3.53 ERA and if that’s not good enough, his xERA suggests that he did even better than what his ERA gave him credit for.

After seeing the Astros absolutely crush Lance Lynn’s fastball in game 1, one might expect Giolito to deviate a little from the 4-seam fastball and rely more on his secondary pitch. Despite throwing 59% fastballs to the Astros the first time around, Giolito found some success in both his changeup and curveball. If Giolito mixes those two secondary pitches well, it can be a very long day for the Astros and the White Sox will be riding the momentum to Chicago.

It is important to note that even though Giolito dominated in his one start this year against them, the game was already lost by the fifth inning so the hitters may have felt less motivation to put up a rally given that it wouldn’t do much for the final game results. Additionally, the Astros have had up-and-down relationships with pitchers all the time. Yusei Kikuchi dominated the Astros back in Minute Maid Park and it looked like he could perform that way over and over but when your team is part of the best offense in baseball, your slumps never lasts forever and eventually any pitcher (expect for Garrett Crochet).