LOS ANGELES -- Carlos Correa and Jose Altuve shared a warm embrace behind second base, joined their teammates in the standard row of high-fives, and then they all made their way off the field. Quickly, quietly.
The Houston Astros -- marked by one of history's biggest cheating scandals in the offseason, beset by injuries when baseball restarted, burdened by their own futility thereafter -- had secured their fourth consecutive trip to the American League Championship Series. But all of their celebrating was done inside, privately -- and maybe that was fitting.
Throughout this season, as the noise around them intensified, Astros manager Dusty Baker noticed something about the way his players responded.
"They closed the circle and got into each other," Baker said after Thursday's 11-6 win over the Oakland Athletics in Game 4 of the AL Division Series. "It made them closer."
The Astros, two games below .500 during the abbreviated regular season, have now won five of six postseason games and await the winner between the New York Yankees and the Tampa Bay Rays. In their latest triumph, the Astros won three of four against an A's team that was seven games better than Houston during the regular season and won 70% of their matchups. Houston did it behind a high-powered offense that floundered through most of the summer and suddenly came to life this week.
The Astros scored 33 runs in 35 innings and slashed .322/.388/.594 at Dodger Stadium -- the site where they secured a World Series championship many now consider tainted. Correa, Altuve, Alex Bregman and George Springer -- a foursome that went from celebrated to vilified with one investigation -- batted a combined .419 with eight home runs.
Correa once again was the igniter in the clincher, launching a 427-foot home run that accentuated the five-run outburst against Frankie Montas and set the Astros on their way. He finished the series with 11 RBIs, tying Nomar Garciaparra (1998 ALDS) for the most by a shortstop in a postseason series. But Correa refrained from making brash statements in the aftermath.
He was asked if his team was motivated to prove people wrong: "Absolutely not. We're motivated because we wanna win. We wanna be able to bring another championship to the city of Houston."
The Astros are here even though they lost their ace, Justin Verlander, and their closer, Roberto Osuna, to Tommy John surgery. They're here even though the reigning AL Rookie of the Year, Yordan Alvarez, underwent surgery on both knees and had only nine plate appearances in 2020. They're here even though 10 of their pitchers made their major league debut this season. And they're here even though their most accomplished pitcher, Zack Greinke, is clearly running on fumes.
"It's been a long, tough road," Baker said, "but we're halfway there."
Baker, 71, advanced to his third championship series in the place where he enjoyed his most success as a major league outfielder. Baker struggled in his first year with the Dodgers in 1976 and absorbed a lot of criticism, then thrived in his second year and enjoyed a lot of praise. The experience taught him a valuable lesson about not letting others dictate his confidence. He got the job as Astros manager only because AJ Hinch was suspended and fired, then Baker spent most of the season feeling like "a substitute teacher." Over time, he learned to embrace the villain label that had been placed on his players.
"I've been a villain most of my life, you know what I mean?" Baker said. "So I might as well join the rest of the group."
The Astros are the fifth franchise to reach four consecutive championship series and the first since the 2011-14 St. Louis Cardinals. It also was accomplished by the 1971-75 A's, the 1991-99 Atlanta Braves and the 1998-2001 Yankees.
This, however, was supposed to be the A's year. After back-to-back 97-win seasons that ended in wild-card eliminations, they had dominated the Astros, conquered the AL West, persevered through the first round and carried the swagger of a team that believed it legitimately belonged among the best in the sport. Heading into this series, Oakland held the one major advantage by virtue of its lights-out bullpen. And then the Astros, a team that finished 26th in OPS against relievers during the regular season, scored 17 runs in 18⅔ innings against A's relievers.
Every eligible A's pitcher took the mound except Mike Fiers, the man who shed light on the Astros' sign-stealing methods.
"It just hurts," A's outfielder Mark Canha said of the end to his season. "It hurts a lot. We worked so hard and we competed and it was kind of a crazy year, and it felt like this was our year."
The A's jumped out in front when Ramon Laureano, whose speech helped ignite a Game 3 comeback, took an ailing Greinke deep for a three-run homer in the second. But Michael Brantley hit his first of two home runs and Correa added his fourth of this postseason to give the Astros a two-run lead in the bottom of the fourth. The A's cut their deficit to one on another homer by Laureano in the fifth, but the Astros responded with two runs in each of the next three innings.
The dagger was provided by Altuve, who batted only .219/.286/.344 during the regular season. He crushed a 428-foot two-run homer in the seventh, his sixth hit in 15 at-bats in this series. It was one of 24 home runs hit by the two teams this week, a division series record. And it was a fitting exclamation mark to an ALDS that proved one very important point: The old Astros, the team most of America now hates, are back.
"We're not done yet," Correa said. "We wanna strive for more."