Astros Clinch Playoff Spot with Win vs. Rangers

The Houston Astros are in the playoffs for the fourth time in the past five seasons following their 3-2 win over the Texas Rangers on Wednesday night.

The Astros have been one of the best teams in Major League Baseball since the start of 2017. They are the only team that won at least 100 games in each of the previous two years and made it three by beating Texas. According to MLB Stats, the last team to win at least 100 games in three consecutive seasons was the 2002-2004 New York Yankees.

On top of clinching a postseason berth, Astros starting pitcher Gerrit Cole struck out 10 Rangers through 8.0 innings. His 300th strikeout of the season came when he got Shin-Soo Choo swinging in the top of the sixth:

Among the reasons for Houston's sustained excellence is the balance of pitching and hitting. The team hasn't ranked lower than sixth in MLB in starters ERA and runs scored in the past two seasons. The Astros currently have the American League's third-lowest ERA (3.71) and MLB's third-most runs scored (870) in 2019.

Despite the consistency from year to year, general manager Jeff Luhnow hasn't been afraid to make bold moves in an attempt to boost his roster.

When the Astros decided to let Marwin Gonzalez test free agency, they replaced him by signing Michael Brantley to play left field. The four-time All-Star is tied for the team lead with a .318 batting average and ranks fourth with a .378 on-base percentage.

As the offense was struggling to score runs in the middle of the season when Carlos Correa and Jose Altuve were injured and a rotating cast of players including Derek Fisher, Jake Marisnick, Tony Kemp, and Myles Straw was playing center field and right field, power hitter Yordan Alvarez was called up from Triple-A in June.

Alvarez immediately became a force in the middle of the lineup, currently owning a .318/.419/.671 slash line and 26 homers.

Justin Verlander, Cole and Wade Miley were the Astros' only reliable starters in the first half, prompting the surprise acquisition of Zack Greinke in a trade with the Arizona Diamondbacks on July 31.

"For us, Zack Greinke was at the very top of our list in terms of players that we thought could impact our chances to win the World Series this year and could really fit in well on this club for the next couple of years while we still have our entire offensive unit together," Luhnow told reporters when the deal was announced.

The quartet of Verlander-Cole-Greinke-Miley had some analysts ranking them among the best starting rotations of all time.

"The Astros have two likely future Hall of Famers in Verlander and Greinke," wrote Danny Vietti of CBSSports.com. "Cole is following the same path. While it might be early to compare this squad to the others on our list, based on potential and individual past success, the Astros are without a doubt one of the most talented rotations to ever assemble."

While there will be plenty of time for history to properly judge where Houston's rotation stacks up among the all-time greats, that group knows it will have a chance to lead the franchise to its second World Series title in three years.