HOUSTON _ The Astros could see this coming long before it happened. They envisioned it, in fact, before they even completed the deal for Justin Verlander. They knew that he is the type of pitcher who will keep his motor running until his tank is empty _ and maybe then some.
As Verlander had said Thursday, on the eve of a game the Astros needed to keep their season going: "My game plan is to go out there, and as the cliche goes, give it everything I've got. I'm just going to focus on trying to execute my pitches, trying not to let the moment get to me, just focus on the task at hand."
Right from the start, he poured everything into this 7-1 Game 6 victory over the Yankees on Friday night, an elimination game for his team. This is why the Astros acquired him Aug. 31, having foreseen a situation when they could give the ball to Verlander and say, "OK, it's all yours, big fella."
It was a dream for the team to have someone like that, someone who could make an opponent's at-bat turn into a nightmare. Witness Todd Frazier, who possibly earned a place in blooper videos with the swing that ended the top of the fifth. Rather than seeing something before it happens, the Yankees batter didn't seem to know what Verlander had thrown him _ a breaking pitch _ until the ball was pretty much past him.
At the last instant, Frazier took a perfunctory hack. And almost instantly, Frazier was trending on Twitter.
Also, right after that, the Astros had a rare offensive surge. In the bottom of the inning, they finally scored a run on two walks and Brian McCann's ground-rule double to right. With two out and the bases loaded, Jose Altuve drilled a two-run single to give his pitcher breathing room at 3-0.
But he ran into trouble in the top of the seventh, walking Greg Bird and hitting Starlin Castro with a pitch. That is why he had warned that, as much as the populace of Houston was depending on him, he was no lock. Verlander pitched out of trouble by striking out Aaron Hicks, getting Frazier to fly out to a leaping George Springer at the center-field wall, and a groundout by Chase Headley.
"I think that's why we as athletes, you get nervous, anxious, all those feelings because it's the fear of the unknown," he said Thursday. "I don't know if I'll be as sharp as I was last time or the last time I pitched in a clinching game or a possible season ending. You just don't know, and that's what's fun about this."
There also was the hard question of the Astros getting to the end of a game, something they had failed to do with a 4-0 lead in the Bronx on Tuesday. The one thing on which manager A.J. Hinch could rely was that Verlander would give it his all.
"I consider him to have a bionic arm," the manager said. "I trust him."
