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    Guardians desperately need a win against the Yankees

    Vaseline Posted on

    The Cleveland Guardians face a deficit in the American League Championship Series that has historically proven nearly insurmountable.

    And that’s before we even consider how outdated they seem against the New York Yankees.

    Is the season of the Guardians done? It’s hard to imagine a different outcome, but let’s think about it anyway.

    “This is who we are,” Guardians manager Stephen Vogt said after his club continued to send the potential tying or go-ahead goal to the plate in Game 2 of this ALCS but lost 6-3 on Tuesday at Yankee Stadium. “We lost two games. That’s true. We have a chance to go home and play in front of our fans.

    “This is who this baseball team is. We don’t give up. We kept fighting. We did it again (Tuesday). I’m excited to come home to Cleveland and play in front of our fans.”

    Will a breath of cool Lake Erie air be the salve for this club? Let’s see if it’s wise for the Guardians to keep hope alive:

    The odds: not in their favor

    Let’s get this out of the way: Teams that take a 2-0 lead in a best-of-seven championship series have gone on to win 32 out of 37 times, or 86.5%. The last team to beat the odds was the 2020 Los Angeles Dodgers, who stormed back from NLCS deficits of 2-0 and 3-1 to beat the Atlanta Braves to capture the pennant and ultimately the World Series amid the COVID-19 bubble in Texas.

    Leverage: The Guardians’ long lost friend

    I’m not sure if watching movies on the plane home to motivate the boys is a thing anymore, but the Guardians may have considered Sylvester Stallone’s 1987 chemically enhanced classic Over The Top as inspiration.

    More than almost any competitor, they excel when they have the upper hand.

    Yet Cleveland has not led in any inning of this ALCS thus far, thwarting their chances to deploy their best weapons in high-leverage spots – and desperately burning them in an attempt to get back in the game come.

    Their loss in Game 2 was an example of what they are dealing with.

    Cleveland started its nominal ace, Tanner Bibee, who gave them at least four innings in two AL Division Series starts and had to spend at least that much more as the club will be without right-hander Alex Cobb for the rest of the postseason after a tax of the lower back.

    But Bibee quickly put them in a 2-0 hole in the second inning, forcing Vogt to do the theoretically unthinkable: intentionally walk Juan Soto to load the bases for Aaron Judge.

    It made sense when the accompanying move was to call up Cade Smith, their main resource and a crucial ingredient in their postseason formula – even if it was the second inning. The move was a wise one: Smith induced a Judge sacrifice fly and escaped the jam with a workable 3-0 lead.

    But Smith is best deployed when the Guardians are in charge, counting down and looking to eliminate the opposition’s mid-table. In the third inning of Game 2, he was done for the evening.

    The desperation resurfaced an inning later, when a walk and two singles (one more a Yankees error) allowed Cleveland to load the bases against New York ace Gerrit Cole in the fourth, still with a deficit of only 3-0. Vogt then played his high card, tossing up ALDS hero David Fry to set up a hit for catcher Bo Naylor.

    “It was the highest leverage moment of the game, bases loaded, one out,” Vogt said. “We want to give it a try with David. That’s where we wanted to make our move. We felt this was our biggest opportunity at the time. You don’t know when you’re going to get three guys against someone like Gerrit Cole.”

    Right call, wrong execution: Fry hacked the first pitch and threw it up, drawing an error to third base. After Brayan Rocchio stared down strike three, the threat was over. Cole, who allowed 10 baserunners in 4 ⅓ innings, had broken free.

    And perhaps most importantly, Fry was done for the night and backup catcher Austin Hedges, who hit .152 this year, was locked in hole No. 8. That reared its ugly head an inning later, when Cleveland pulled within 3-2 came and had the tying run at first base.

    No problem for the Yankees. Reliever Clay Holmes simply threw four balls to Andrés Giménez, welcomed Hedges to the plate and retired him. And a 3-2 game remained that way before the Yankees stretched the lead to 4-2 and eventually 6-2 after Aaron Judge’s home run.

    “It’s who we are,” says a rather ruthless Vogt. “We take risks when we do that.”

    Win without rotation?

    The difference in starting pitching in this ALCS has only grown since tip-off. Cobb’s ineffective start and subsequent injury now leaves Cleveland short of a potential Game 5 starter; Bibee’s inability to complete two innings put them in a new situation, but now raises the idea that the right-hander’s 39-pitch performance could make him available for a fresh start sooner.

    Yet there is simply no end in sight to the downside.

    Lefty Matthew Boyd will start Game 3, and he matched presumed Cy Young Award winner Tarik Skubal by pitching over 4 ⅔ shutout innings in Game 2 of the ALDS. Still, he got just six outs in Game 5 and threw just 39 ⅔ regular-season innings after recovering from injury.

    New York? It will be disappointing with the reliable Clarke Schmidt, who made an effective Game 3 ALDS start that turned that series in his favor. Schmidt also posted a 2.85 ERA in 16 starts this year.

    He is already familiar with Progressive Field in October, making two relief appearances there in the 2022 ALDS.

    “Pitching on the street with fans coming at your throat, it’s kind of nice to have the ability to silence them whenever you want, if you can get the job done,” Schmidt said during a video call Wednesday, before the club left for Cleveland

    Yankees manager Aaron Boone says, “He’s gotten better and better every year. That was really cool to see, but it starts with a foundation of confidence because he is really talented.”

    Boyd certainly is too. Still, there is once again a ceiling on what he could be capable of — and the likelihood that the Cade Smiths and Hunter Gaddises from the bullpen will be called up much sooner than Vogt would like.

    Game 4? The Yankees take over the postseason wraps from Luis Gil, the AL’s top rookie pitcher, who has had 19 days to suit up for the assignment. Bibee might be back for Cleveland by then.

    Do you feel like this is getting out of hand?

    Guardians: Still a good baseball team

    Their current sinkhole has obscured some positives. Steven Kwan has extended his postseason hitting streak to 12 games, knocking Kenny Lofton out of Cleveland’s record book, and is batting .448 (13 for 29), his 13 hits trailing only Mets rookie Mark Vientos’ 14 in these play-offs.

    They’ve forced the Yankee bullpen into close-and-late situations in every seventh through ninth innings. Vogt is right when he claims that by continuing to push, the Guardians may soon find a breakthrough.

    “We love playing in front of our fans,” Vogt said Wednesday at home in Cleveland. “I think knowing we have three games here, we feel really good about it. Obviously we would have liked to win one in New York, but we still feel good about our chances.”

    Even now, the odds are only increasing.

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