The Yankees and Rangers square off in the ALCS starting Friday night at 8 PM EDT. The Yankees faced the Rangers three times in the ALDS in the 1990s, winning nine of the ten games played. Here is how their offenses compared during the regular season:

The Yankees, quite simply, put a much better offensive team on the field. They do a great job getting on base and a good job hitting for power in a down year. I suspect the spread might even be a little bigger with Josh Hamilton up to full speed yet. He went two for 18 in the League Division Series, striking out six times against the Rays. He’s playing on damaged ribs. Those ribs didn’t seem to outwardly bother him much in the LDS, as he dove for balls in the outfield and seemed to swing without pain at the plate. It could be, however, that he’s compensating for the injury and his swing is a little off. It could just be bad luck, as anything can happen in 18 at bats. It could also be that he’s just rusty from not playing most of September. The Rangers hope it’s one of the latter two options, and that his offense comes back against the Yankees.

Then again, missing Hamilton might be made up by getting Ian Kinsler back. He missed most of April and all of August, but when he was in the lineup, he was a force on a offense. We saw that in the LDS as well, with three of his eight hits leaving the park. This is a great series if you like offense at second base, as Robinson Cano was the MVP on the Yankees.

The Rangers will likely start four of the seven games with left-handed pitching. There was a time that teams went out of their way to stat left-handers against the Yankees, especially at Yankee Stadium, but that’s not the case this year. The Yankees hit slightly better against lefties in 2010, as their three switch hitters, Mark Teixeira, Nick Swisher and Jorge Posada all found success against southpaws. Alex Rodriguez‘s poor season (by his standards) came about due to his trouble against lefties. I suspect his .217/.314/.441 line against lefties involved a lot of bad luck, and that might change at any time.

The other thing that makes the Yankees offense tough is that there are no easy outs in the lineup. Curtis Granderson is likely the only starter with a below league average OBP. He came in at .324 when the AL finished at .327. What’s different about this team compared to previous teams is that there is not a collection to players with very high OBPs. Cano and Brett Gardner are the only two in the .380s, as Mark Teixeira, Rodriguez and Jeter all turned in below average years in the OBP column. Still, this is a team that does a good job getting on base from top to bottom, and that causes a pitcher to work more.

Here’s how the pitching and defense compares:

The Rangers win the pitching and defense side of the debate. Notice that they don’t win it by as much as the Yankees win the offensive side, however. Both team strike out batters at a good rate, walk few and give up a good number of home runs.

Both teams send out very good, left-handed aces. CC Sabathia and Cliff Lee pitched together on the Indians as late as 2008. That season marked the start of Lee’s dominance after returning from and injury filled 2007. Since that time, Lee and Sabathia are very close in ERA, less than 0.1 runs separating them. CC struck out batters at a higher rate over that time, while Lee walked many fewer and also did a better job of keeping the ball in the park. Sabathia wins the hit game, however. Opponents hit just .236 against CC over those three seasons (.292 OBP), while opponents hit .255 against Lee with a .283 OBP. Lee’s better ERA is reflected in his lower OBP, but because his the hit component of his OBP is higher, there’s more opportunity to do damage against Lee when someone reaches base.

Note that the Yankees have not hit Cliff well in this span, .245/.287/.368. The Rangers don’t hit CC well either, .246/.312/.348. Since these two won’t face each other, however, the series could easily be decided by the other starters. If Lee and Sabathia each wins two games, then it comes down to who wins two out of three in the other three games. This is where it gets iffy. The Yankees haven’t decided on which order Andy Pettitte and Phil Hughes will pitch. Phil has a much better ERA on the road, so if they start him in game two, he also gets to pitch game six in Texas. So game two would be Hughes against Colby Lewis, game four would be Tommy Hunter against A.J. Burnett, and game six would match Hughes and Lewis again. I would remind you that in a very small sample size, Phil Hughes has been nearly unhittable in Texas. The Yankees have not seen Lewis since 2003.

As for Hunter vs. Burnett, that’s anyone’s guess. Hunter is not as good as his ERA indicates, Burnett could be super or awful. Here’s how I see the series going:

1. Sabathia beats Wilson.
2. Hughes beats Lewis.
3. Lee beats Pettitte.
4. Neither Hunter nor Burnett pitch well, and the better Texas bullpen wins the game.
5. Sabathia beats Lewis Wilson for a second time.
6. This is the critical game. If the Yankees win this one, they don’t see Lee again. If they lose…
7. Pettitte vs. Lee. Andy holds the most wins in the post season, Lee the best winning percentage in the post season. Two lefties for all the marbles, and I suspect it would be one for the ages, a low scoring, one-run game, likely Lee coming out on top.

So it turns out that this series may very well hinge on the fourth starters. If Burnett pitches a gem that game and the Yankees win, that takes a lot of pressure off Hughes and Pettitte. I would not want to face Lee in game seven.

Texas showed in game five against the Rays they are not afraid of taking the extra base. That game should put the Yankees on alert, and they’ll need to be on their toes when the Rangers are running the bases. The flip side is that those plays are high risk, high reward. When they work they’re game changers, but when they fail they are also game changers, often taking teams out of big innings.

This series is a tough call. The Yankees do have a bigger advantage on offense than the Rangers do on the pitching side. Texas will need to get to game seven to give Lee a second chance to win. That’s tough to do. I’ll make New York a slight favorite here, with a 52% chance of winning the series.

Update: The Yankees indeed decide to start Hughes in game two and Pettitte in game three. I believe this is an excellent decision.