ARLINGTON (CBSNewsTexas.com) – This didn’t seem possible a month ago, maybe not even a week ago.
Rangers pitcher Max Scherzer will take the mound in a postseason game for the 28th time in his illustrious 16-year career on Wednesday night at Globe Life Field.
This will be the first time in five weeks that the 39-year old three-time Cy Young Award winner has pitched in a game. On Sept. 12 in Toronto, Scherzer pitched 5 1⁄3 scoreless innings, securing his 13th win of the season.
The next day Scherzer was shut down “at least for the rest of the regular season” with a strained right teres major, which is a muscle in the upper back below the shoulder.
At the time, Rangers GM Chris Young said it was “unlikely” Scherzer could pitch in the playoffs. At the time, without Scherzer, it was unlikely the Rangers would MAKE the playoffs.
Yet, here the Rangers are! They are back home riding an unlikely seven-game postseason winning streak, with an unlikely 2-0 lead over the defending World Champion Astros in this unlikely American League Championship Series.
So far in the playoffs, the Rangers have done this on the shoulders of two veteran starting pitchers, Jordan Montgomery and Nathan Eovaldi, who have combined to start six of the seven games the Rangers have won.
With a shaky bullpen, it seemed unlikely that the Rangers could win a best of seven series with only two reliable starting pitchers.
However, that was before we learned that Max is back.
If indeed this is a healthy Scherzer who takes the mound for Game 3 on Wednesday night, in front of the loudest and most raucous Rangers crowd ever, then all of a sudden, an unlikely Rangers postseason journey to the World Series becomes quite likely.
By the way, the first time Max Scherzer pitched in a league championship series was 12 years ago when he was a member of the Detroit Tigers and lost two games to the Texas Rangers.
The only time Scherzer has faced the Astros in the postseason was four years ago when he won a World Series ring with the Washington Nationals, starting Game 1 and Game 7 victories.
