Dodgers vs. Astros 2017 live stream: Time, TV channel, and how to watch World Series Game 3 online

After a pair of close, exciting games in Los Angeles, the World Series shifts to Minute Maid Park in Houston, beginning with Game 3 between the Los Angeles Dodgers and Houston Astros on Friday night (7:30 p.m. ET, Fox).

The two teams split the games in Los Angeles, including a wild Game 2 that featured a World Series-record eight home runs, including a postseason-record five long balls in extra innings. The previously impenetrable Dodgers bullpen, which allowed four total runs in their first nine postseason games, allowed six runs in the final four innings on Wednesday night.

“I do believe that the momentum is the next day’s starting pitcher,” Dodgers manager Dave Roberts said on Thursday. “Yu Darvish is going to pitch well, and we expect to win the baseball game.”

Darvish is 4-0 with an 0.88 ERA in his last five starts with 35 strikeouts and two walks, including two wins and just two runs allowed in his two postseason starts.

Lance McCullers Jr., who closed out Game 7 of the ALCS with a four-inning save including 24 consecutive curveballs to finish his night, gets the start for the Astros, who are 6-0 at home this postseason.

In three games this October, including two relief appearances and one start, McCullers has a 2.08 ERA with 13 strikeouts and five walks in 13 innings.

“He’s a confident kid. He believes in his best stuff matched up against the best stuff of the other guy, that he’s going to be better. He’s a challenge-first type guy,” Astros manager A.J. Hinch said. “His belief in himself is second to none.”

Hinch denied reports that he was involved in an altercation after Game 1 at a bar in the team hotel in Pasadena, Calif., per Jake Kaplan and Greg Rajan of the Houston Chronicle:

“There was no altercation,” Hinch said. “It’s a shame I get asked about some nonsense and fabrications and non-stories, and I have to respond to it on a national stage.”

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Hinch described the report as “ridiculous” and added that “fabrications really suck, and I’m not going to address any of them.” An Astros spokesperson cut off a follow-up question, and Hinch’s previously scheduled off day news conference shifted to baseball topics.

Despite their bullpen losing Game 2, including the first career postseason blown save for Kenley Jansen, the Dodgers remain confident as the series shifts to Houston:

“The bottom line is I’ll take Kenley any day of the week with a one-run lead going into the ninth inning,” manager Dave Roberts said.

It was just the second blown save in 46 attempts for Jansen in 2017, including the postseason. The Dodgers were 98-0 this season, including the playoffs, when leading at the beginning of the ninth inning, the only team in baseball not to lose in that situation in 2017.

Until Game 2, that is.

“There’s a lot of ways you can take this. Sometimes you just have to tip your cap and give the other team credit,” said Kiké Hernandez. “They have a really good ball club and a really good lineup, and put some good swings on the baseball tonight. We did too, but fell just a little bit short.”