Fourth place. That’s where the Cleveland Guardians sit as of this morning, four games behind the surprising Chicago White Sox in the AL Central Division race.
On Friday, May 22nd, the Guardians beat the Phillies 1-0 on Kyle Manzardo’s home run in the 9th to raise the team’s record to 31-22. They had a 3.5 game lead over the Pale Hose and the second-best record in the American League. They were fourth in the league in runs scored, so the offense was generating runs.
Since then, Steven Vogt’s crew has gone 27-39 and the offense has plummeted to third last in the major leagues in scoring. And now the bullpen is collapsing, with only Cade Smith being reliable for Cleveland last in games.
By the way, that’s a 66-game span, which is 40% of the regular season. That’s not a slump, that record over that span shows a bad baseball team.
Cleveland’s front office said they wanted to lean on the organization’s young hitters to provide offense in 2026 after the Guards made the playoffs a year ago despite the 29th ranking offense in the game. That sounds like a good thing, right? But depending on all young players is tough because they tend to have many more ups and downs than a veteran.
And that’s why a priority should have been to get a veteran bat or two to help ease the transition.
Offensively, the Guardians did get two bats at the trade deadline in Jo Adell and Nathaniel Lowe, and the pair would seem to be the perfect platoon. However, it appears the organization thinks of Adell as an everyday player, and he isn’t very good vs. right-handed pitchers.
The problem is still not enough good hitters in the lineup. The league average OPS is 719. The Guardians have four players above the threshold and one of them is Austin Hedges, which is a complete surprise.
Steven Kwan (.364) and Chase DeLauter (.354) are the only Cleveland players with an on base percentage over .350, and the latter’s slugging percentage of .433 leads the team, which tells you there is no one on the Guardians who can drive the ball.
The organization sent Kyle Manzardo to AAA and his slugging average is 8th on the team, slightly behind Travis Bazzana, Rhys Hoskins, and the recently released Gabriel Arias. Our question here is why does Hoskins stay, while Manzardo, who is tied with him for the team home run lead, get sent back to the minors?
Let us be clear, Manzardo’s swing is messed up, as he is trying to pull everything this season. We wonder who told him to change his approach?
Speaking of approaches, let’s look at Brayan Rocchio, who had a good start to the season. On May 31st, he was hitting .293 with a 789 OPS, hitting mostly in the #9 spot in the order. He had fanned 26 times with 20 walks as of that date and had 4 homers with 27 RBI.
Since then, he’s batted .208 with 39 strikeouts and just 11 bases on balls, and five dingers with 23 RBIs. Did he feel more pressure to provide pop after the injuries to DeLauter, Jose Ramirez, and Angel Martinez? Or was it because the team started hitting him in the middle of the lineup?
He’s batted .232 with a K/BB ratio of 19:4 when batting in the #3, #4, and #5 spots in the order.
Yes, the bullpen is in shambles and frankly, the options to improve it aren’t really there. But don’t think the Guardians’ offense has been saved with the trades made at the deadline. They still don’t have enough good bats.
Cleveland Sports Perspective 