Playoffs game blog: A look at the O's against the playoff field and tonight's games

The Orioles finished the 2015 season with a .500 record, going 81-81. But they had a record of 26-37 (.413) against teams that made the 2015 playoffs.

Here is the rundown:
* 8-11 against Toronto
* 10-9 against the New York Yankees
* 3-4 against Kansas City
* 1-6 against Texas
* 3-4 against Houston
* 1-3 against the New York Mets

The Orioles did not play four teams that made the postseason - St. Louis, the Chicago Cubs, Pittsburgh and the Los Angeles Dodgers. The Orioles went 18-13 (.581) at home against the playoff teams and 8-24 (.333) on the road. They won eight series, lost 10 and tied two.

In the National League Division Series tonight, the Chicago Cubs host St. Louis and later the New York Mets host the Los Angeles Dodgers, with each series tied 1-1. In the wild card era when a Division Series has been tied 1-1, the Game 3 winner went on to take the series 25 out of 32 times.

Right-hander Michael Wacha (17-7, 3.38 ERA) starts for the Cardinals and will try to beat Jake Arrieta (22-6, 1.77), who pitched a complete-game five-hitter with no walks and 11 strikeouts against Pittsburgh in the NL wild card game.

In 12 starts since Aug. 1, Arrieta is 11-0 with an ERA of 0.39. Over his last four starts, including the wild card game, he has not allowed a run over 31 innings. In that time, he has given up just 11 hits and one walk with 38 strikeouts. Beyond incredible stuff from Arrieta.

Wacha, meanwhile, had a very poor finish to a solid overall season. In September, he went 2-3 with a 7.88 ERA. In 24 innings, he walked 18 and gave up seven home runs.

In the last game today, lefty Brett Anderson (10-9, 3.69 ERA) of the Dodgers faces the Mets' Matt Harvey (13-8, 2.71 ERA). Among qualifying pitchers, Anderson led the majors with a 66.3 percent groundball rate. He went 2-1 with an ERA of 5.14 in Sept./Oct. Harvey was very good at Citi Field this season, going 8-3 with a 2.23 ERA in 17 starts.

In today's first game: A Kansas City Royals comeback saved their season and ruined the kid's show. Houston's 21-year-old shortstop Carlos Correa went 4-for-4 with two homers but the Royals rallied to beat Houston 9-6 to tie the series 2-2 and force a Game 5 on Wednesday night at Kansas City.

Kansas City went to the top of the eighth trailing 6-2 but then scored five in the eighth and two more in the ninth to stun the Astros, who were six outs from a series win. Kansas City is now 9-1 in its last 10 postseason games when facing elimination, dating to the 1985 American League Championship Series.

Correa is the second-youngest player in MLB history with a multi-homer postseason game. Atlanta's Andruw Jones at 19 years, 180 days is the only younger player when he did this in 1996. The Orioles Manny Machado was the third youngest-player to homer in a postseason game when he did so at age 20 years, 96 days in 2012.

In the second game, Toronto took a 7-1 lead on Texas in the fifth inning. The Blue Jays hit three homers in a postseason game for the first time ever with Josh Donaldson, Chris Colabello and Kevin Pillar connecting. A Toronto win would force a fifth game in this series.