World Series Game 5 Prediction: Rangers vs Diamondbacks

The Texas Rangers are just a win away from claiming their first World Series in franchise history after a commanding 11-7 victory in Game 4 on Tuesday night, and they won't have to wait more than 24 hours to play the potential clincher.

Nathan Eovaldi will get the start, but can we trust him after his poor start in Game 1?

Let's break down this matchup and submit our Rangers vs. Diamondbacks Game 5 prediction.

It wasn't the most exciting regular season for Nate Eovaldi, but when it was all said and done he posted an improved strikeout rate and continued to roll up more ground balls as the season wore on. His lone weakness was in the walk department, and he erased that in October with five free passes in 30 2/3 innings.

More than that, he's just been a very reliable arm for Texas save for one inning in Game 1 of this series. He's still sporting a solid 1.33 ground out-to-air out ratio through five starts with a 3.52 ERA, and he's struck out seven or more in four of his five outings.

Arizona managed to sneak a couple of ground balls through for hits before a huge triple from Corbin Carroll which swung the momentum of Game 1, and from there the damage wasn't all that catastrophic. There's every reason to believe he can have success here against the Diamondbacks, particularly in a pitcher's park like Chase Field.

As for the Rangers' offense, we saw with an 11-run explosion on Tuesday that this team is more than just ALCS MVP Adolis Garcia. Texas has lost its second-best hitter for the remainder of the series due to injury, but the depth of this team will continue to carry it through.

Most impressively, one of the top fly ball teams in the league, often reliant on the homer, managed to score 10 runs in three innings on eight ground balls, three line drives and just seven fly balls in Game 4. If the Rangers can continue to do that, they should be well-positioned to win again in Arizona.

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The Diamondbacks will be hoping that Zac Gallen has figured something out here in October. The righty didn't have the best showing in the NLCS versus Philly, but outside of that series he's been somewhat effective. He entered the series with a 3.18 ERA through two postseason starts and escaped with just three earned runs through five frames in Game 1, but his October, and his season as a whole, have been very complicated.

Gallen has taken some big steps forward in recent years when it comes to limiting walks, but through 27 1/3 innings this postseason he's now walked 13 against just 18 strikeouts. That's come along with six home runs, though the Rangers accounted for none.

Still, he allowed five hard-hit balls in Game 1 and all were either line drives or ground balls. The problems seem to extend beyond just hard-hit balls which have a high probability of leaving the yard, and against a Rangers team that's been awfully patient this postseason with a 9.9% walk rate things may get worse.

Offensively, Arizona is always going to be limited in terms of what they can do considering its approach. It will put the ball on the ground the majority of the time, and it won't take very many walks, and while that has created some traffic on the basepaths the chances of a killer blow will be slim. While you might think the DBacks would be well-equipped to deal with a ground ball pitcher, too, they only hit .246 versus ground-ballers this year with a meek .714 OPS.

While he did struggle a bit in Game 1 of this series, the Diamondbacks are a dream matchup for Eovaldi. They will put the ball on the ground plenty, and with arguably the best infield defense in the game behind him I have a hard time seeing the Diamondbacks touching him up for five earned runs again.

On the other side, the Rangers have proven they can run up the score without fly balls and homers, and they've also proven they can do so without Adolis Garcia after making it this far without any contributions from leadoff hitter Marcus Semien.

I expect the depth of this Rangers offense to continue shining, and these hitters should be more than capable of getting Eovaldi the run support he needs to put forth a winning effort here. Sure, Dane Dunning may be unavailable here and the same may go for Jon Gray, but I think Eovaldi will work deep into this one and the Rangers will finish off the Snakes in five.