The Astros’ Last Stand — Altuve Hate, Correa Hate, Even Biden Hate Works Fenway Park Into a Lather and This Special Houston Group is Running Out of Time

BOSTON —  The ball bounces off Jose Altuve’s chest, right above his glove, and Fenway Park erupts in pure maniacal joy. There are super villains who take less pleasure in someone else’s pain. The Houston Astro who Beantown loves to loathe most serves up a readymade gift for all his haters. An error. The proud, tough Astros look like they are unraveling before everyone’s eyes.

Soon, it’s 6-0 Red Sox. Then 9-0 Red Sox for the second straight game. The recent gold standard of the American League is not just getting beaten. Alex Cora and his merry band of disciplined bashers are bullying the Astros, shoving them around like we’ve never really seen them pushed before.

Later, Red Sox starter Eduardo Rodriguez will mock Astros shortstop Carlos Correa’s “It’s My Time” celebration, tapping his wrist like Correa does when he hits a big home run after retiring the Houston star to end the top of the sixth. The Red Sox are feeling it and Fenway Park’s a raucous party long before “Sweet Caroline” breaks out in the eighth inning.

“It’s an addicting feeling,” Red Sox slugger Kyle Schwarber says after this 12-3 Boston win. “Especially in this place where it’s just rocking the whole time and it’s rowdy and they’re in tune to every single pitch.”

While it’s party time for Red Sox nation, the Astros are left to quietly shuffle out of their clubhouse and head for their buses. The unique setup of Fenway Park, a ballpark built in 1912, requires going up a flight of steel stairs with red railings to do that. Astros reliever Ryne Stanek carries a small ice cream cone in his hand as he makes the climb. That is about the only sweet thing to come out of Fenway for this Astros team. Even ever happy rookie pitcher Luis Garcia is not smiling as heads for the bright yellow buses.

If these Astros cannot find a way to get up off the mat against the Red Sox, the heart and soul tandem of Jose Altuve and Carlos Correa are likely playing their last games together.

Winning one of the next two games here to push this American League Championship Series back to Houston suddenly almost looks like a near impossible mission. That is how badly things are going for Dusty Baker’s team. The Red Sox have outscored the Astros 21-8 in the last two games while hitting three grand slams.

Now, Houston will turn to Zack Greinke, the former Cy Young winner who lost a regular starting role down the stretch of the season, to start Game 4 Tuesday night. This is not where these 95 win Astros expected to be.

“We’ve got to put up more runs,” Kyle Tucker says. “If they put up nine, we’ve got to try and put up 10.”

Tucker’s postseason run is something that gives hope for more retooled Astros runs in the future. The 24-year-old is playing like a star in these playoffs, adding a three run home run in Game 3, the only damage the Astros can manage against Rodriguez. But Tucker cannot carry the Astros past the Red Sox without much more help.

As he stands on the side, talking to reporters near the Astros clubhouse, wearing cowboy boots, Tucker represents the Astros’ future. But its present sure looks like it is facing its last stand.

If these Astros cannot find a way to get up off the mat against the Red Sox, the heart and soul tandem of Jose Altuve and Carlos Correa are likely playing their last games together. This Game 4 start, abbreviated as it might be because of his recent workload limitations, would very likely be Zack Greinke’s final moments with the Astros too. Like Correa, Greinke’s also a free agent to be.

The winds of change are howling around this Astros team, louder and more insistently than ever.

Only a win can hold them off — temporarily.

“We know what happened here today,” Correa says, “It was not a great game for us. It was terrible. But tomorrow. . . We’ve been here before.”

Not really. The Astros have never looked this overmatched before during their entire magical, often dominant run, dating back to 2015. In falling down 3-2 to the Yankees in the 2017 ALCS, and even while trailing the Tampa Bay Rays 3-0 in last year’s COVID ALCS, this Houston team has never appeared this out of it.

In many ways, these Red Sox are toying with the Astros, making an ace-less team feel the pain.

“Today was a close as we’ve been to a perfect game,” says Alex Cora, the ex-Astros bench coach who is now 17-5 in the playoffs as Boston’s manager.

Inside the Fenway Park Madness

Cora celebrated his 46 birthday with this Game 3 romp. The Red Sox fans just celebrated heckling the Astros. The “Fuck Altuve! Fuck Altuve!” chants are almost old hat at this point, but this Fenway crowd added plenty of Southie bluster. Correa, the Yankees and even Joe Biden also got rounds of the FU chant.

Yes, weirdly the Boston crowd decided to declare their displeasure with the president (who isn’t within 400 miles of the ballpark) in the late innings too. An announcement about the City of Boston’s renewed mask mandate also brought loud boos. At least, Santa Claus is still safe in Beantown for now.

Just don’t dress up as Altuve for Halloween around here.

When I left Fenway Park well after midnight, walking by the giant “America’s Most Beloved Ballpark” sign, an Astros fan in a No. 27 Altuve jersey, walking with his girlfriend, was still getting it plenty of. . .  feedback. “Bang your trash can,” a twentysomething in a Rafael Devers Sox jersey called out to the departing Altuve representer. “I know you will!”

It is that kind of night. The night before what could very well be this Astros’ team as we know it’s last stand.

And some of the Astros seem very aware of the moment. Big picture implications included.

“It’s big,” Greinke says when someone asks him what it means to get the start. “I mean, it’s an important part. I mean, great group of guys here. Some of the best guys that I’ve been around. And it’s an important game so I’ll do what I can. Hopefully help us out.”

So much change howling at the door. Can anyone on the Astros stop it from bursting in?

Alex Cora and his merry band of disciplined bashers are bullying the Astros, shoving them around like we’ve never really seen them pushed before.

Dusty Baker is not under contract for next season either. Not that this sunny side up baseball lifer would ever bring that into the equation.

“You don’t like it tonight,” the Astros manager says of his team’s second straight lopsided loss. “But the sun is going to come up in the morning.”

Baker is 12-8 in the playoffs as the Astros manager. Getting win No. 13 suddenly looks like the hardest of them all.

The happy loud crazies at Fenway Park smell blood. Alex Cora’s team does too. The Astros’ Last Stand? It sure looks like it. Now or never.