Browns’ Physical Play Is The Way To Go

When Deshaun Watson was officially suspended for 11 games, the Cleveland Browns and coach Kevin Stefanski needed to find a formula to win enough football games while Watson was out.

That formula figured to be run the heck out of the ball and play defense. Cleveland has two of the best running backs in the sport and an offensive line that at least in the interior is also one of the premier units in the league. So, offensively, the plan makes sense.

While neither Carolina and the Jets will make anyone think of great defenses, last Thursday’s win over the Steelers showed the Browns have the ability to push around a physical defensive unit. We know Pittsburgh was missed T.J. Watt, but Kevin Stefanski’s group still managed 171 yards on the ground, led of course by Chubb, who ran for 113 on 23 carries.

If Cleveland can continue to get the kind of quarterback play they have the past two weeks from Jacoby Brissett, we will all feel better about how things will play out until Watson comes back.

After a subpar performance in the season opener, Brissett has been very good. On Thursday night, he completed 21 of 31 passes for 220 yards and two touchdowns, following up on a solid effort against the Jets.

Cleveland has scored 26, 30, and 29 points in the first three contests this season, so the offense has been humming. And give Stefanski his props for the way he has called games, keeping the opposing defense off balance.

Helping Brissett immensely has been WR Amari Cooper. It is safe to say Cooper has been what we all wanted Odell Beckham Jr. to be? The veteran had his second consecutive 100 yard game receiving and he and TE David Njoku gave the Pittsburgh defense fits.

We remember watching Cooper last season in a game started by Cooper Rush for the Cowboys, and he took control of the game on the winning drive in the fourth quarter. We thought it would be nice if the Browns had a receiver like that. And now they do.

The defense was improved, but in the first half seemed to have a problem against the run. In fact, Cleveland did give up a season high 104 yards on the ground, but they made adjustments at halftime and Pittsburgh was not as effective in the second half.

And the secondary did not give up any of the “chunk” plays they gave up in the first two weeks of the season.

However, with Jadeveon Clowney out and Myles Garrett less than 100% due to a neck problem, the pass rush was pretty much absent. The Browns had just one sack (by LB Jacob Phillips), and that was with Garrett being doubled and triple teamed.

We still don’t understand why the Browns don’t play more man-to-man defense particularly with their corners and go after the passer more often. You have to think opposing offensive linemen are tied up with Garrett and there should be some blitzing lanes.

After blowing the game against the Jets, Stefanski and his team needed a win. They got it. If the defense can get back to playing at the level they were late last season, they may win more often than initially thought with Watson sidelined.

Never Happier To Be Wrong On Guardians.

Late in the 2020 baseball season, we were asked what the future of the Cleveland Guardians would be if they traded shortstop Francisco Lindor.

We felt they would be in for a bit of a rebuilding phase; we figured it would be about four years before they could compete again.

We are very happy to be wrong, as it took just two seasons before they are returning the post-season, as they will be wrapping up the AL Central either today or sometime during the season against Tampa at Progressive Field this week.

Kudos should go to president Chris Antonetti, GM Mike Chernoff, the player development department, skipper Terry Francona and the coaching staff, and the players. There is nothing like unexpected success, and most people did not figure the Guardians would be making the playoffs in 2022.

The organization made a major shift to more contact-oriented approach offensively, and also stopped trying to plug holes with stop-gap veterans and instead giving the younger players a shot.

It was surprising to many that not only did Steven Kwan make the opening day roster, he pretty much started from day one, and produced immediately, hitting .295 with a .371 on base percentage, and playing excellent defense.

Bobby Bradley and Yu Chang, two hitters with contact issues, were in the lineup for game one, but after an offensive explosion in the third game of the series vs. Kansas City, Francona stuck with the hot hands and the Guards got off to a decent start.

In addition to Kwan, the farm system also produced Oscar Gonzalez (.291, 794 OPS), who stepped into rightfield. At various points, we also saw Nolan Jones and Richie Palacios, and currently Tyler Freeman, Will Benson, and Will Brennan are on the roster.

So, the offense improved, and the pitching remained the strength of the organization.

After the trade deadline, on August 6th, the Guardians were just two games back and we made a comment on social media that if Cleveland wanted to get to the post-season, they needed their starting pitching to step up.

That night, Cal Quantrill threw six shutout innings vs. Houston, and the next day, Triston McKenzie blanked the Astros for eight frames. And since then, the starters led by those two and Shane Bieber, have been dominant.

Quantrill has made ten starts including the outing vs. the Astros, going 6-0 with a 2.31 ERA in 58-1/3 innings. McKenzie has gone 4-3 with a 2.39 ERA in his nine appearances, and Bieber has shown again why he’s the staff ace, with a 6-2 mark and a 1.68 ERA in 64-1/3 frames.

And if the Guards have the lead after six, the triumvirate of Trevor Stephan, James Karinchak and Emmanuel Clase, with a little sprinkling of lefty Sam Hentges make it very difficult for the opposition to come back.

Cleveland ranked 13th in the AL in runs scored with Lindor in 2020, then improved to 9th in ’21 and currently rank 7th. Beside the emergence of Kwan and Gonzalez, the offense has received a boost from a full season of Josh Naylor (19 HR, 73 RBI, 780 OPS), and one of the players who came from NY in the Lindor deal in Andres Gimenez.

At the time, we said he was the key to the deal, but we didn’t anticipate this. Played Gold Glove defense at second base, Gimenez, who hit .218 last year in 68 games, has batted .303 (856 OPS), hit 16 homers, knocked in 67 and stolen 19 bases.

He ranks third in AL in WAR, behind only Aaron Judge and Shohei Ohtani.

That’s a big-time contribution.

The best thing might be yet to come though. The Guardians are the youngest team in the game and have one of the best farm systems in baseball.

Nothing is guaranteed, but it looks like it could be the beginning of another post-season skein for the team that plays at Progressive Field.

Why Do The Browns Get Most Of Our Sports Love?

We have said many times that our favorite sports are baseball and basketball, making us a minority in a city that presents itself as a football city.

That doesn’t mean we don’t follow and root for the Browns, we certainly do, and find it crazy that there are people in town who are die-hard followers of the brown and orange, but pay no attention to the Guardians or Cavaliers.

We are lucky to live in a city with three major league professional franchises and we don’t take that for granted.

Our question though is why do the Browns get so much love and loyalty in northeast Ohio, and do they deserve it?

For older fans like us, it could be because the Browns were the only winning team in our youth, that being the late 60’s. The Cleveland Browns were one of the premier franchises in the NFL from the time they entered in 1950 until basically 1970.

At that time, there were no Cavaliers (started in 1970-71) and the Indians were just starting a malaise that lasted from 1960 through 1993.

After pretty much a dormant period in the 70’s and early 80’s (excluding the Kardiac Kids season of 1980), the Browns reemerged as Super Bowl contenders in the late 80’s, led by Bernie Kosar, Hanford Dixon, Frank Minnifield, etc., coming up just short in some of the most excruciating ending to seasons you could imagine.

However, if you were growing up in the 90’s, the Guardians and Cavaliers have been far more successful than the Browns have since returning to the league in 1999.

And maybe that’s it. Perhaps the loss of the team for a few seasons has created a fear that if people aren’t zealous in their support of the Browns, they will move again.

Or maybe we are just grasping at straws.

Since 1995, the Indians/Guardians have made 12 post-season appearances (likely to become 13 with this season) and have played in the World Series three times, losing twice in heartbreaking circumstances.

That shouldn’t be held against them, see our earlier comments about the Browns of the late 1980’s.

The Cavaliers have played for the championship of their sport five times in this span, and cashed in 2016, the only professional title in a major sport the city has seen in the last 58 years.

The Browns? They made the playoffs twice since 1999.

That’s why we don’t understand the undying loyalty of sports fans in this area.

What about ownership? We understand baseball fans here don’t like the Dolan family because they rarely go “all in”, but it’s not like the Haslams or Gilberts are on the same par as Bill Veeck.

Haslam has had business issues and is very impulsive. How many regime changes have the Browns gone through since he bought the franchise? Gilbert inherited LeBron James, but he did everything he could to bring a championship to the city.

We understand the midwest is by and large a football haven. The NFL has it’s roots right in Canton, which is why the Hall of Fame is there. High school football is a big deal in Ohio, so the leaning toward the pro football team is understandable.

Again, we aren’t saying to not root for the Cleveland Browns. We would love nothing more than a Super Bowl berth for them. But, they certainly don’t give fans here a great deal to be proud of, instead they have given us a tremendous amount of anguish.

We guess the heart wants what the heart wants, even if it doesn’t make a great deal of sense.

Another Breakdown, This Time Results In A Loss

Cleveland Browns’ fans should be celebrating the first 2-0 start to a season since 1993 this morning, but instead, they are incensed the team blew a 13 point lead with under two minutes to go at home against one of the three AFC teams no one is projecting as a playoff contender, the New York Jets.

Last week, in discussing the Browns win over Carolina, we said the breakdowns in the secondary have to be fixed, as it just didn’t happen in week one, it occurred many times in the 2021 season as well.

Wouldn’t you know, it happened again.

The long pass to cut the lead to 30-24 was bad enough. The defense simply cannot let the opponent score that quickly. And it appeared Denzel Ward thought he was supposed to get help deep, and he didn’t, so someone was on the wrong page.

However, it also happened at the end of the first half, when no one thought to pick up Breece Hall coming out of the backfield and allowing the Jets to tie the game going into the half.

Again, if this was a one time thing, it can be excused. It’s not. It happens over and over and over again, and if we were Kevin Stefanski, Joe Woods would have to come up with a good reason that it happens along with a course of action to make sure it doesn’t happen again.

It’s not like there is no talent in the secondary, it is loaded with high draft picks, so that would seem to us that GM Andrew Berry is also not happy with Woods.

Ward and Greg Newsome are first round picks, Grant Delpit is a second rounder, and Martin Emerson is a third rounder. John Johnson III is a high priced free agent. That’s a lot of draft capital and financial commitment involved to accept play like this.

Look, the reality is the Browns have dominated each of their first two games and should have won both by 10 or more points, but they are a Cade York 58-yard field goal miss away from being 0-2 despite that.

The offense has operated just as everyone expected coming into the year without Deshaun Watson. And they’ve scored 56 points in the two games. There is nothing to complain about there.

After a rough start against Carolina, Jacoby Brissett was very good last Sunday, completing 22 of 27 passes for 229 yards. Amari Cooper caught nine balls for 101 yards and Nick Chubb and Kareem Hunt combined for 187 total yards.

We know David Njoku dropped a pass, but overall, we can’t think of anyone on offense who had a poor game. Everything operated according to plan.

However, all of that was erased because the defensive secondary can’t get its act together.

Maybe Stefanski has to give up the play calling responsibilities to make sure he’s more involved with the defense. But something needs to change going forward, starting Thursday night against Pittsburgh.

The breakdowns simply have to stop. At a certain point, Stefanski needs to tell Woods he doesn’t want excuses, just results. After all, this is professional football. There are no moral victories.

Guards Have A Lot Of Rookies, But They’ve Contributed Greatly

Part of the charm of baseball is it seems simple enough to the average fan, so it is easy to think they know more than the manager of their favorite team, in this case, Terry Francona.

We do it too, so we aren’t going to get on a soapbox and proclaim Francona doesn’t know what he’s doing, but on the other hand, we have said this before, Tito is not the Pope, he is not infallible.

For example, the Guardians use Owen Miller kind of as a platoon player when he has not demonstrated much success against southpaws, hitting .214 against them with a 606 OPS.

When Cleveland faced three lefties vs. the Angels earlier this week, Miller was in the lineup all three games, going 5 for 10. Of course, he did!

And while fans like us can sit there and say the Guardians need to go 5-4 in this stretch of nine games (they are currently 3-1) which will probably decide the AL Central, the reality is Francona’s philosophy has been just win the game you are playing today, because really, that’s all you can control.

He talks to his team, in fact, the entire 40-man roster in spring training telling them they are all part of this, and the team will probably need contributions from each player during the long 162 game season.

Although we advocated for Oscar Gonzalez late last season (and Steven Kwan as well, not enough patting ourselves on the back), he wasn’t even on the 40-man roster when the team gathered in Goodyear in March, but what a contribution has he made to this team.

Kirk McCarty looked to be an “organizational arm” coming into the year, but he’s put together several solid outings in long relief to help the team. He doesn’t seem to have outstanding stuff, but he’s been an unsung part of the 2022 Guardians.

Cody Morris has always been a highly regarded prospect, but he’s been called upon to make four starts (including today) in September in a pennant race. He hasn’t been great, but in his last two starts, he’s given the Guards a chance to win.

Richie Palacios has been up and down several times this season, but he’s contributed some huge pinch hits, a tough role for the young player. It will be interesting to see what his role will be in 2023.

Nolan Jones ultimately struggled to make contact at the big-league level, but when he first was called up, he gave the offense a much-needed jolt, which was needed at the time. No doubt he will complete for a permanent job next season, but the organization couldn’t afford patience while in the middle of a division race.

Tyler Freeman provided a big hit this past week, Will Benson made a fine catch at Target Field. Most of the young players who had received an opportunity this season have contributed.

That says a lot about Cleveland’s player development system, and that these guys are prepared when they arrive in the Guardians’ clubhouse.

So yes, Steven Kwan gets a lot of attention and rightly so, he should finish in the top three of the AL Rookie of the Year voting, but there have been a number of rookies who have contributed to the success of this team.

It’s not just having 15 MLB debuts, they have made an impact as well.

Nine Games To Settle The Central.

In about a week we should have a pretty good idea about whether or not the Cleveland Guardians will win the American League Central Division and qualify for the post season.

Starting with tonight’s make up game with the White Sox, the Guards will play nine straight contests against Chicago and Minnesota, the two teams battling them for the division title.

The magic number going into the single game against the Pale Hose is 18, as Cleveland leads Chicago by three and the Twins by five. The Guardians and Twins have 21 games left, while the Sox have 19.

Also important is their no longer is a tie breaking game to qualify for the playoffs. If their is a tie in the standings, the season series is the determining factor and Terry Francona’s squad needs just one victory against each of these two teams to get that edge.

After a 10 game stretch against Seattle and Baltimore where the club went 2-8 and tallied just 16 runs, the Guardians have roared back by winning eight of nine, including a huge sweep of Minnesota at Target Field.

The starting pitching and the back end of the bullpen have been tremendous in this stretch, with the rotation providing 51-2/3 innings allowing just 13 earned runs, a 2.26 ERA, and that includes rookie Konnor Pilkington allowing four runs in five frames on Monday against the Angels.

Remember, Pilkington is filling in for injured starters Zach Plesac and Aaron Civale.

The bullpen, led by Emmanuel Clase (Death. Taxes. Clase), James Karinchak, and Trevor Stephan have simply dominated opponents in this stretch, and really we should also include southpaw Sam Hentges in this group as well.

Clase had a rare bad outing against KC in the last game there, walking three hitters (one intentionally) and Karinchak allowed a two run homer after his hair products were called into question by Twins’ skipper Rocco Baldelli in Minneapolis.

Stephan has allowed four earned runs since August 1st, and overall this year, has struck out 72 batters in 56-2/3 innings, and has given up just three home runs. Hentges has given up just one runs since the end of July and he’s allowed three dingers on the season as well.

Overall, Cleveland relievers have pitched 467-1/3 innings with a 3.14 ERA and 47 home runs allowed. We hate to pick on Bryan Shaw, but if you remove his numbers from these statistics, the ERA drops to 2.81 and the long ball total is 39.

If this trend can continue, the balance of the schedule would seem to be in good hands.

Offensively, it would be nice if Jose Ramirez got on one of his hot streaks, but until then, rookie Oscar Gonzalez has been doing the job.

Gonzalez has hit four homers in September, slugging .596 and even walking four times this month (he’s only walked 12 times since his call up). His three run homer in the first inning in Minnesota got Cleveland off to a good start, and another homer Tuesday vs. Los Angeles was the difference in the game.

Remember, since they have the division lead, going 4-5 or 5-4 in these nine games is perfectly fine, it just takes the nine games off the schedule.

Let’s hope the pitching continues as it has over the last week or so and the hitting provides just enough runs.

Hey, It Counts, Right? Browns Are 1-0

A win is a win is a win. That’s what Browns’ fans should be saying today after Sunday’s 26-24 victory over the Carolina Panthers.

We believe Jim Donovan, the radio play-by-play man for the Browns said it best. It’s a good win, because it would have been a terrible loss had rookie Cade York not made a 58-yard field goal to win it and give Cleveland their first 1-0 start to a season since 2004.

It is difficult to win in the NFL, so no one should take anything for granted, but the despite Deshaun Watson’s suspension, the Browns have a better football team than Carolina, and should get a win against them.

However, going forward they will need much better play from QB Jacoby Brissett, who was pedestrian to be kind in the opener, completing 18 of 34 passes for just 147 yards and a touchdown. That’s 4.32 yards per attempt, the lowest of any starting quarterback in the league in week one.

We think he will be better this week, but it will be tough to beat any good team in the NFL with this kind of passing attack. Just something to watch.

Donovan’s comment comes from the Browns simply dominating most of the game. They controlled the ball for 38 minutes.

But two missed coverages (we presume) by the secondary put Carolina right back in the game. Down 14-0 in the second quarter, Panthers’ QB Baker Mayfield found Ian Thomas wide open for a 50-yard gain, and Carolina converted into a TD.

Then, after York’s third field goal made it 23-14 Cleveland, the defensive backfield had another mix up resulting in a 75-yard bomb to Robbie Anderson, and suddenly it was a ballgame.

These types of mistakes seems to happen too often for the Browns. Remember, the Chargers game from a year ago, when it occurred twice. both times with Cleveland leading. And most times, you have players looking at each other as if to say “I thought you were supposed to take him”.

That has to be cleaned up for sure.

The run defense, which was a concern of ours, was fine, but then again, the Panthers didn’t really try to run the ball, attempting just 19 times for 54 yards. Their best play besides the two long passes was a recovered fumble off a bad snap that Christian McCaffrey ran for 30 yards.

That actually breathed some life into the Panthers.

Other thoughts-–

Myles Garrett had two sacks, bringing his career total to 60.5 tying him for fifth on the team’s all time list with Paul Wiggin. Next up for Garrett is Walter Johnson at 66.

Is there a more underrated great player in the NFL currently than Nick Chubb? He gained 141 yards on 22 carries and seemed to do it without notice. He’s averaging 5.3 yards per attempt for HIS CAREER.

We know GM Andrew Berry tried to address the return game by signing free agent Jakeem Grant, but they need to find a punt returner and quick. Demetric Felton seemed to have problems with the first three punts to him and actually fumbled the third, but luckily the Browns recovered.

Good to see coach Kevin Stefanski use Chubb and Kareem Hunt at the same time. Along with Amari Cooper, they are the team’s biggest offensive weapons.

And kudos to Donovan Peoples-Jones who had an excellent game with six catches, most of which were in traffic.

Guards In An Old Fashioned Pennant Race.

When the Cleveland Indians dominated the American League Central Division from 1995-2001, winning six titles in seven seasons. They usually won by a pretty good margin:

1995: 30 games
1996: 14.5
1997: 6
1998: 9.5
1999: 21.5
2000: lost by 5 games
2001: won by 6

Even in the Terry Francona era, when the team won by 8 games in 2016, 17 games in 2017, and 13 games in 2018.

So there haven’t been a lot of “pennant races” in the recent past. Perhaps the closest thing fans experienced is the race to get to the wild card game in 2013 when the Tribe overcame a 4-1/2 game deficit on September 1st, going 21-6 in that month and qualifying for the playoffs on the last day of the season.

Well, the Guardians are in a race right now.

They lead the Central Division by a game and a half over Chicago and 3-1/2 over Minnesota today and play the Twins six more times and the White Sox four before the season ends with a nine game homestand vs. Tampa Bay (3) and Kansas City (6).

If you ever longed for “meaningful baseball” as a fan or media person, here you are. It is very likely there will be high stakes each and every time the Guardians take the field for the rest of this season.

And by the way, Minnesota and Chicago also have six games between them remaining including a three-game set to close the year in the Windy City. The Pale Hose seem to have the easiest path, schedule wise, as outside of the games versus the other contenders, the only likely playoff team they will play is San Diego.

Cleveland has the three against Tampa, and both the Twins and Guards have the Angels, who have a bad record, but also have Mike Trout and Shohei Ohtani.

As for Francona’s squad, they have to cobble together 2/5ths of a starting rotation going forward, losing Aaron Civale and Zach Plesac to injuries. When Cleveland comes home on Monday to start a nine game stretch at Progressive Field, they are probably looking at the first two contests where the bullpen will have to play a significant role.

And the back end of that ‘pen has been worked hard recently, and could use a couple of blow out victories.

Emmanuel Clase pitched in three straight games last week, had one day off, and uncharacteristically blew a save at Kansas City. After last night’s save, he’s pitched on six of the last eight days.

James Karinchak has done the same, and he struggled a bit Friday night, giving up his first home run of the season after Twins’ manager Rocco Baldelli had the umpire run his fingers through the relievers’ locks.

Francona certainly has his pecking order when his team has the lead, but going forward he will need Enyel De Los Santos, Bryan Shaw, Nick Sandlin, and Sam Hentges to pitch in during close games to keep Clase, Karinchak, and Trevor Stephan fresh.

That’s the downside to the plan, when the Guardians are on a winning streak, the primary trio gets overused, and particularly this season where wins by five runs (just 15) are not plentiful.

And Monday and Tuesday, he will also need the inexperienced Cody Morris, Konnor Pilkington, and Kirk McCarty to step up and give the team quality innings.

It will be a challenge for sure and should be fun for the fans. A real pennant race, with tension filled games, scoreboard watching, etc.

We also ask the front office to do whatever they have to do to get people in the seats. This team deserves that.

In the meantime, have fun!

For Browns, Time To Win Is Now, Even Without Watson

This Sunday, the Cleveland Browns kickoff the 2022 NFL season with a game against their old quarterback, Baker Mayfield, who is now leading the Carolina Panthers.

With suspended QB Deshaun Watson sidelined for the first 11 games of the regular season, expectations by many media people, both local and national, aren’t very high and most of the experts have Cleveland missing the playoffs.

We are not one of those people.

The Browns have talent at many positions. They have probably the best tandem or running backs in the league in Nick Chubb and Kareem Hunt. They have two of the best guards in the NFL, and a top wide receiver in Amari Cooper.

That’s just the offense.

The defense features perennial Defensive Player of the Year candidate Myles Garrett, former first overall pick Jadeveon Clowney, and Pro Bowl cornerback Denzel Ward.

The entire defensive backfield should be very good and along with the pass rusher should deter an aerial assault from opponents.

We would like to see the defense improve against the run. Cleveland ranked 12th against the run last season, and the old adage is even in today’s pass-happy NFL, you can’t win if you don’t stop the run.

Kevin Stefanski was Coach of the Year in 2020, but his team fell to 8-9 a year ago, and frankly, we think he needs to answer some questions this season. By the way, they doesn’t mean we want him fired, but we would like to see him grow as a head coach.

We believe Stefanski lost confidence in the offensive line after injuries hampered Jedrick Wills and took Jack Conklin out for the year, and that’s why he became reactive in his play calling. What we mean is a philosophy of “the defense is taking away the run, so we have to pass”.

And we think we ask this every year, but why can’t there be a package where Chubb and Hunt are on the field together? If you ranked the offensive skill players by ability, wouldn’t those two rank in the top three?

However, we feel the time to win for the Cleveland Browns is now, and frankly we don’t care if Watson is missing the first 11 games this year. The organization put themselves in this position, so if Cleveland winds up 7-10 this season, the blame should be put at their feet.

As for the coaching staff, come up with a scheme that moves the ball, puts points up on the scoreboard and keeps the other team off of it. That’s why they are coaching in the NFL.

The challenge for the coaches is to minimize Jacoby Brissett’s weaknesses, so the Browns can remain in contention when Watson returns to the lineup. Put players like Garrett, Ward, Chubb, Hunt, Cooper and TE David Njoku in situations where they can make an impact.

We don’t want to hear that missing the playoffs is okay because of the Watson suspension, the organization can’t be alright with writing off another season.

Winning is necessary. The Browns have the better team in our opinion this Sunday and should win the game. We won’t excuse them if they do.

The Browns aren’t an average team hoping their quarterback can lift them to playoff contention, they are a very good team that needs the QB to go along for the ride.

Analyzing The Guards’ Offensive Woes.

The Cleveland Guardians raised their record to 66-56 on August 24th when they beat San Diego 7-0. Since then, it has not been pretty for Terry Francona’s squad and ugly for the offense.

Cleveland has lost 8 of 11 since that win, scoring more than three runs in a game just three times (all of the wins) and being shutout four times in that span.

Seven of those contests were against Seattle, with the Mariners taking six, but we would not say the Guardians were dominated, but their hitters were. Two of the games went to extra innings, and in three others, Mariners’ hitters could muster only three runs in each game.

They’ve had more than one extra base hit in just four of the last 11, winning three of the four. And they have just three home runs, all coming in wins–Jose Ramirez connected in the 4-3 win at Seattle, and Josh Naylor hit one in the 5-1 win over the Orioles, and another in last night’s win over Kansas City

The Guardians don’t walk much (enough) as a team any way, ranking 12th in the American League, but the base on balls have hard to come by too. They’ve drawn more than three walks in just two games, but Sunday night’s game was one, as they drew five, but two of those were intentional in the 10th inning.

They’ve had nine hits in half of the games, but without mixing in some doubles, triples, and homers, it’s very difficult to score unless you string hits together, which currently they are not doing.

The Guardians don’t hit the long ball but are 6th in the AL in doubles and 3rd in triples, so they have extra base hit ability, but it has disappeared as of late.

It doesn’t seem like any more help will be coming from the farm system either. Despite the offensive issues, when the rosters expanded to 28 on September 1st, the Guards brought up Ernie Clement, who was hitting .238 in AAA, and was sent to the minors because he hit .203 with the big club.

Clement seems to be superfluous on a roster that already has Owen Miller and Tyler Freeman on it, especially when the latter has problem getting at bats.

Nolan Jones and/or Will Brennan (.360 OBP/801 OPS) would seem to be better fits, particularly with Oscar Gonzalez in a bit of a slump and Myles Straw in a massive one.

We’ve all seen the numbers on Straw. He’s hit .159 (382 OPS) since the All-Star break, and we’ve said this repeatedly over the years, it doesn’t matter how good you are defensively (and Straw is very, very good), if you can’t hit, you can’t play regularly in the major leagues.

Apparently, unless you play for Cleveland.

We aren’t sure if Will Benson can succeed in the bigs, but he’s received just 42 plate appearances over the last month, so it’s not like he’s received a real big chance.

We also know about the offensive issues at the catcher’s spot, except for Luke Maile’s hot August nights (nod to Neil Diamond), so the 8th and 9th spots in the batting order have become designated outs for opposing pitchers.

The frustration for fans is the lack of activity by the manager or the front office. We respect and acknowledge Francona’s impact on this team, but we’ve also said his biggest weakness is his patience can turn into stubbornness.

Despite all this, the Guardians are still tied for first in the Central. If they can start scoring runs again, they can still be playing in October.