Houston Sports: The three worst moments of 2018

Moment #1: The Houston Astros disappointing 2018 ALCS collapse

The Houston Astros were primed to repeat as World Champs.  The stats, the probabilities, the talent and just being the darlings of Major League Baseball, all trended toward the direction of bringing another crown back to the Minute Maid Park.

But that’s why you have to play the games.  The Astros won a franchise-record 103 games after a mostly-eventful September and with all signs pointing toward a successful postseason, there was little for all of us to be worried about.

Little did we know that Jose Altuve‘s knee injury, Carlos Correa‘s back, Charlie Morton‘s lingering right shoulder injury were certainly going to be important factors going into October.

The Astros aced their ALDS test against the Cleveland Indians with ease as they were able to use the long ball to get past them quite easily, sweeping them out the door.

The only thing that was eventful was that the Twitter beef between Trevor Bauer and Alex Bregman came full circle as Bauer alleged that the Astros were stealing signs as a elucidation for their success.

That culminated with mighty Bregman home run in Game 2 and getting the last laugh.  The team eventually advanced to the ALCS and that series had Bauer regretting that he had stirred up something in one of the league’s brightest stars.

Then came the ALCS against the Boston Red Sox, who had just as good — if not better — season than the Astros.

We all were charged up about Game 1’s 7-2 win over the Red Sox at Fenway Park where it seemed the Astros were ready to strike it big and get back to the Fall Classic.

We all recall that ill-fated 6th-inning when Joe Kelly and Bregman had an epic stare down as Kelly

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hit him with 100-mph pitch causing him to take his base.  The two continued to stare at each other thereafter but Bregman had the go-ahead run after Correa’s single, ensuring that he once again had the last laugh in the team’s win.

But after Game 1, the Astros lost their mojo, their edge, the reason for wanting be great and it’s almost to the level of inexplicable.

From accusations of the team putting a camera in the Red Sox’s dugout at the Juicebox to Joe West’s controversial fan interference call involving Mookie Betts with everything in-between, the Astros continued to have problems.  They never could get over the hump and succumbed quietly into the good night in five games.

I expected it to be a hard-fought battle all the way to end but with all of the challenges the team faced during the season and were still able to win 103 games, the 2018 season was still one of my favorite ones to watch on record.

As the team works to try to get another trophy yet again this season — all that will be on their minds is how to beat the Red Sox once and for all to be back on top of the heap next season.

Let’s hope for the best. 

And that, Houston Sports fans, are the three worst moments of 2018.  Do you agree?  What are yours?  Feel free to sound off below.