Rangers Wonder Rookie Evan Carter Gives the Astros a Real Reason to Worry — A No-Way Catch Builds Serious Underdog Belief

HOUSTON — After calling his unlikely postseason life “awesome” at the interview dais, wonder rookie Evan Carter returns to the visitors clubhouse at Minute Maid Park. He’ll pack up some food from the postgame spread into a styrofoam container to bring back to the Texas Rangers’ hotel. And as he makes his way back to the dressing room, a club employee stops him and shows him a video of his no-way catch that robbed Astros star Alex Bregman at the wall and maybe flipped this entire super charged all-Texas American League Championship Series upside down.

Carter smiles and politely watches the video. The Rangers’ out-of-nowhere lifeline difference maker looks every bit like the 21-year-old kid he is. There is no pretense, no posing, no attempt to try and make himself look cool. Evan Carter is just living this baseball life as it comes to him, grabbing onto the moments.

“The talent that this guy have is something special,” Rangers center fielder Leody Taveras says of Carter. “I’m not surprised by what he can do. It’s something that. . . it’s a privilege for us to have a guy like him.”

The Rangers didn’t have this guy until September 8th. That is when Evan Carter made his Major League debut. He’s been in the Big Leagues for little more than a month — and he’s changing everything for this often seemingly star-crossed Rangers franchise.

His performance in Game 1 of the ALCS in Minute Maid, the site of more horrors for the Rangers over the last several seasons than one of those Saw movie torture chambers, is his best yet. There is Carter turning a little flare single past Astros first baseman Jose Abreu into a double, scoring the first run of the game. Creating it really. There is  Carter leaping in the little nook in left center field, using every bit of his skinny 6-foot-4 frame and his fully extended left arm to yank a Bregman bomb out of the sky.

The Carter Catch — as it will remembered in Texas Rangers lore — comes just to the left of the white 366 sign on the wall. Evan Carter won’t officially get a save for this 2-0 Rangers win that lets Bruce Bochy’s team believe it can actually topple the defending world champions. But he should.

“Every game, he does something else,” veteran Rangers outfielder Robbie Grossman says. “It’s amazing.”

In this Game 1 of the American League Championship Series, the rookie pulls Rangers reliever Aroldis Chapman out of another seemingly looming Astros nightmare. Instead of Jose Altuve scoring, Bregman getting to second and a one on no out situation looming with the Astros only down 2-1 in the eighth inning, Carter makes the catch. Altuve is doubled up when he just rounds second base and fails to step on again it before returning to first base.

And the Rangers are out of danger and on the way to a much-needed 1-0 series lead.

By Evan. Everything’s all right.

“I know I hit it pretty hard,” Bregman says. “But it was a little high off the bat.”

It won’t have been a home run. But Bregman’s blast would have been a game-shifting double off the wall with almost anyone but the Rangers’ wonder rookie playing left field.

Rangers veteran outfielders Robbie Grossman and Travis Jankowski made sure Carter was ready for Bregman’s blast, going over the unusual contours of Minute Maid in the Rangers workout at Houston’s ballpark the day before this Game 1. Including the dip into an awkward corner where the Crawford Boxes end.

Of course, Evan Carter still needed to have the talent, skill — and daring — to actually make that catch.

Carter warms up by making an impressive — if not quite no-way — catch on Bregman near the left field line in the bottom of the first inning. Yes, the Rangers rookie essentially turns the Astros stalwart’s entire night into a Bregman bummer.

Credit Rangers second baseman Marcus Semien with a Magic Johnson worthy assist on the eighth inning double play. For it’s Semien who points out to the umpire that he thinks Altuve failed to retouch second and gets the Rangers to call for a replay review.

“That’s one that we go over in spring training,” Semien says. “And all of a sudden in the ALCS, it comes through.”

Now the Astros are the ones who need their championship mettle to come through. With a quick turnaround to Tuesday afternoon’s Game 2 looming, Altuve, Bregman, Yordan Alvarez must get over this loss as quickly as Pete Davidson gets over the end of a relationship.

“This team is the best I’ve been around about moving on,” Astros manager Dusty Baker says.

“We lost Game 1 in the World Series last year,” says Astros ace Justin Verlander, who found himself out pitched by Jordan Montgomery. “We’ve lost Game 1 of some playoff series before. And that’s the great thing about this team. . . It’s very matter of fact.

“We just got punched. How do you answer?”

The Rangers have been doing all the punching this postseason, rolling on into Game 2 with a still perfect 6-0 record in these playoffs. It feels like even more of magic carpet ride thanks to what Evan Carter is doing. Game after game. No way moment after no way moment.

By Evan. Everything’s all right.

“He’s playing tremendous,” Rangers catcher Jonah Heim says of the rookie. “He works really hard. There’s really not much more you can say about him. He deserves to be the Rookie of the Year.”

“The talent that this guy have is something special. I’m not surprised by what he can do. It’s something that. . . it’s a privilege for us to have a guy like him.” — Leody Taveras on rookie Evan Carter

The True Tales of Evan Carter

Evan Carter played less than a month in the Big Leagues before the regular season ended. He won’t win Rookie of the Year. But a little playoff hardware is much more valuable anyway.

“I mean, I’m just having fun,” Carter says on that interview dais. “That’s what it’s all about. We’re playing a game. And it’s a fun one too. I’m just out here having a great time.”

Maybe this is what the Rangers need to finally make it back to the World Series after absolutely blowing the chance to win one — and become the first Texas champion — back in 2011. A rookie star who doesn’t seem to know any better. Who doesn’t understand you’re not supposed to be able to top yourself playoff game after playoff game.

“I think more than anything he just has so much confidence,” Rangers manager Bruce Bochy says of Carter. “He’s got the youthful enthusiasm and he’s just excited to be here. He’s not in awe of anything. Just no fear in this kid since he came up.

“I saw that in Spring Training, he plays with joy. That’s what you love about him.”

This pairing of the Rangers’ 68-year-old baseball lifer of a manager and the 21-year-old rookie from little Elizabethton, Tennessee (population 14,015) almost sounds like some farfetched buddy movie pitch script. Only these Rangers are eagerly turning every page, dying to discover what new wonder is next.

By Evan. Everything’s all right.