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3 things you need to know - ALDS: Royals at Angels

Peter G. Aiken-USA TODAY Sports

A riveting, 9-8 extra-inning victory over the Oakland Athletics in the American League wild-card game earned the Kansas City Royals a date with baseball's best team.

The Royals will face a potent Los Angeles Angels squad in the AL Division Series which won a major-league high 98 games during the regular season. It will be no easy picnic containing the Angels, who are looking to get through the ALDS for the first time since 2009, but the Royals have already responded once this postseason with their backs up against the wall.

Here are three things you need to know about the ALDS matchup: 

Expect the Royals to run

Kansas City, which swiped a major league-leading 153 bases during the regular season, stole seven in its come-from-behind 12-inning win over the A's.

The Angels' catching duo of Chris Iannetta and Hank Conger will face a difficult task trying to limit the Royals' running game. Iannetta, who received the bulk of playing time behind the plate, has been more successful than Conger at throwing runners out, and is slightly above the 2014 league-average rate of 27 percent, according to Baseball Reference

Player 2014 CS% Career
Iannetta 30% 25%
Conger 24% 22%

Jarrod Dyson, Alcides Escobar and Lorenzo Cain all converted on more than 80 percent of stolen-base attempts. That threesome, combined with Nori Aoki and Alex Gordon, provides Kansas City with five players who stole double-digit figures. Rookie Terrance Gore, meanwhile, swiped 47 at Triple-A Omaha.

Mike Trout's 1st taste of the postseason

The best player on the planet will get his first crack at October baseball.

Mike Trout, the favorite to claim the AL's Most Valuable Player award, heads into his inaugural postseason as the catalyst of an Angels team which scored the most runs in baseball, led by the 23-year-old's major league-leading total of 115. 

Here's how Trout fares in select categories since 2012, as ranked by Fangraphs' wOBA metric: 

Player wOBA HR WAR wRC+
M. Cabrera .418 113 19.8 168
M. Trout .411 93 28.4 170
T. Tulowitzki .408 54 11.8 146
J. Votto .404 44 12.8 158
A. McCutchen .402 77 21.8 160
D. Ortiz .394 88 9.1 150
G. Stanton .393 98 14.0 151
E. Encarnacion .391 112 11.7 148
P. Goldschmidt .390 75 13.6 145

Relief pitching could determine series

Both teams possess a strong bullpen, each ranking in the top 10 in FIP. 

Los Angeles made a mid-season overhaul to its backend with the additions of Jason Grilli and Huston Street. The pair have thrown well since arriving, and coupled with a pre-existing group including Joe Smith, Kevin Jepsen and Mike Morin - all relievers with sub-3.00 ERAs - the Angels are well-equipped for a tightly-contested game.  

With manager Mike Scioscia's preference to  go with a three-man rotation for the ALDS, that also means Cory Rasmus will be pitching in relief. He struck out 44 and held hitters to a .189 average in 17 appearances, including six starts, over 39 innings in the second half.

Los Angeles' bullpen may need to provide some heavy lifting with struggling lefty C.J. Wilson and recovering rookie Matt Shoemaker following Jered Weaver in the rotation.

The Royals, meanwhile, have a seventh-eighth-ninth-inning combo of flamethrowing right-handers Kelvin Herrera, Wade Davis and closer Greg Holland that's as good as any in baseball.

Here's how the trio stack up against the 2014 league-average rates among relief pitchers (average four-seam fastball velocity is according to PITCHf/x data at Fangraphs):

Pitcher 4-seam FB K rate ERA FIP
MLB average 93.0 22.2% 3.58 3.60
Herrera 96.4 20.7% 1.41 1.69
Davis 95.6 39.1% 1.00 1.19
Holland 95.7 37.5% 1.44 1.83

Rookie Brandon Finnegan, a 2014 first-round draft pick, who made a big impact in the wild-card game, and Danny Duffy give manager Ned Yost a pair of potential weapons from the left side. Duffy's a candidate to start Game 4, but will be available in relief.

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