Guards Need Hitting And More Hitting This Off-Season

Well, it’s all over.

After a furious comeback, an MLB record for the Cleveland Guardians, coming back from a one-time 15.5 game deficit to win the American League Central Division title, the Guards lost two games to one in the Wild Card Series to their division rivals, the Detroit Tigers.

The season ends with another post-season appearance, but with the championship drought now at 78 years.

We are not celebrating because they failed. They didn’t even get as far as Steven Vogt’s crew did a year ago, when they got to the AL Championship Series. And you know what, the Vogt and his team aren’t celebrating either.

The Guardians should take satisfaction from the fact they did not lay down when faced with the huge deficit, something that other teams have done. And frankly it was something of a miracle for Cleveland to win the division because this was one of the worst offensive clubs in Major League Baseball, ranking 28th in runs scored and 29th in team OPS.

Cleveland batted .226 as a team the lowest in club history. The previous low for a full season was in 1968, a year the sport refers to as “The Year Of The Pitcher”. Baseball changed its rules, lowering the pitchers’ mound after that season.

The last time they had a team OPS this low was in 1991. The then Indians’ record that year was 57-105.

We have said it all season long. This club has three good hitters: The incredible Jose Ramirez, Steven Kwan, and Kyle Manzardo. Everyone else is frankly bad.

How bad was it? Well, the organization brought Chase DeLauter, who hasn’t had a big-league bat in his life, up to start the last two playoff games. And DeLauter wasn’t alone. In those games, the Guardians also played George Valera, who had 48 plate appearances and C.J. Kayfus, who had 138.

Remember, the Guardians traded one of their best hitters from a year ago because he was entering the last year of his contract. So, the organization did this to themselves.

As the organization enters the off-season, there simply has to be an emphasis on getting more hitting. Certainly, DeLauter, Valera, and Kayfus figure into the mix, but the Guardians should not put all their eggs into the “rookie” basket. And those four, along with another top prospect, Travis Bazzana, all hit from the left side.

They need a “professional” hitter, preferably right-handed to add depth to the lineup.

They also need to be truthful to themselves about some of the players on the roster. We heard several times on telecasts about the “breakout” year from Gabriel Arias. He batted .220, right in line with his .215 career mark, and although his OPS was a career high at 638, it is still way below league average.

Daniel Schneemann, at age 28, received the 7th most plate appearance on the roster. He had a very good month of May, but after June 1st, he hit just .188. Again, that’s over a four-month span.

Angel Martinez received the fourth most plate appearances on the team and his OPS was just 628. The problem was there weren’t any real alternatives and to be fair, Martinez was pretty good vs. lefties, with a 792 OPS.

More emphasis has to be put on getting on base. Cleveland ranked 29th in on base percentage in the major leagues. Only four players with more than 100 plate appearances got on base at even a 30% clip. Carlos Santana joining the Ramirez, Kwan, Manzardo trio.

Why do they need to be better offensively? On the top ten teams in the majors in runs scored, eight made the playoffs. Only the Diamondbacks and Mets didn’t get there, and both of those teams were in the mix in the last week of the regular season.

The Padres (18th) and the Guardians were the two teams making the post-season without having a good offense. Normally, the top run scorers get to play in October. The Guards can’t tempt fate in 2026.

Let’s hope ownership opens their wallets and the front office doesn’t rely solely on rookies to help.

Much Like The Entire Month, The Post-Season Clincher Was Unreal.

Somehow, it was fitting that the Cleveland Guardians clinched a playoff spot last night on a hit batsman with the bases loaded.

When C.J. Kayfus got hit with a Robert Garcia pitch, the party was on, but probably somewhat muted because a win tomorrow means Steven Vogt’s crew will open the Wild Card Series at home on Tuesday.

The post-season clinching game was kind of a microcosm of the entire year. Vogt put Johnathan Rodriguez in the cleanup spot in the lineup, replacing David Fry. We said on social media that it was an odd choice, seeing the Rodriguez was only called up because of the Fry injury, and he had only amassed 70 plate appearances with the big club all year.

But there he was in the bottom of the first, hitting a two-run homer to give Cleveland the lead. And then, Rodriguez started the winning rally, drawing a two out walk.

Kyle Manzardo, who didn’t play against left-handed pitching most of the year, then blooped one into left field against the southpaw Garcia, sending pinch-runner Petey Halpin to third.

Texas intentionally walked Gabriel Arias, kind of an odd move with Arias’ swing and miss tendencies, to load the bases.

By the way, it was also the first time Garcia hit a batter the entire season.

Joey Cantillo, who started the season in the bullpen, and had two stints in the minor leagues during the season, was the starting pitcher in the game. He also was the starter on September 3rd, an 8-1 win over the Red Sox that started this stretch.

And of course, the bullpen played a big role with Hunter Gaddis getting four outs and Cade Smith getting five. They were the anchors of the relief corps most of the season, and the skipper leaned on them heavily.

Of course. There was something unexpected about the entire run the Guardians went on after losing their first two games in September. Winning 19 of 24 games is incredible in itself, especially when the Guards were pretty much a .500 team heading into that stretch.

Make no mistake, the run was accomplished with incredible pitching. Cleveland has allowed just 67 runs in the month, their previous low in a month in 2025 was the 101 allowed in June. That’s an unbelievable turnaround.

They won seven games where they scored three runs of less during the streak. That’s insane.

They got huge hits during the run from Kayfus, whose 2-run homer turned a 2-1 Kansas City lead into a 3-2 Cleveland win on September 11th.

Another rookie, George Valera, belted a big homer last Wednesday to get the Guards going in a 5-1 win. And Jhonkensy Noel, hitting .152 on the season, homered off Tarik Skubal, on September 18th.

And of course, Rodriguez last night.

They can finish the job today with a win that would give the team their second consecutive division title and their 14th since the three division set up which started in 1994, and their 15th post-season spot in the same time frame.

To be honest, we have no idea how this happened considering the offense is still among the worst in the majors, but who cares. It’s fun just enjoying the winning.

The off-season seems to go quicker when the Guardians are in the playoffs.

Three Weeks Left, Guards Are Still Hanging In

Recently, we have taken to calling the Cleveland Guardians zombies because seemingly they will not die. This is a team that suffered through a 9-16 month of June, and a 10 game losing streak that spanned from June 26th through July 6th.

From August 15th to August 23rd, they lost nine out of ten games and fell six game behind Seattle for the last wild card spot in the American League.

They have the second worst offense in the AL, ahead of only Kansas City and while the pitching staff currently ranks 6th in the league in ERA, that is largely due to a current seven game stretch where they’ve allowed just 11 runs.

According to WAR (at least the BaseballReference.com version), they are the worst team in the league, and have the worst non-pitchers, including ranking 15th at centerfield, rightfield, and pinch-hitters, and second from the bottom for the entire outfield.

We have noted in the past that their projected win-loss record based on runs scored and runs allowed is 68-76, so they have outperformed that by six games. The standard deviation is four games, so yes, luck has been a big part of this.

Yet, here they are, just 3.5 games away from the last playoff spot in the Junior Circuit, with 17 games to play. You can pooh-pooh the team’s record all you want, but if you don’t get into the tournament, you don’t have a chance, and Steven Vogt has his team playing for a shot to get in it.

For all of the complaining we fans do about the lineup, platooning, and relief pitcher usage, yes, we are talking about Matt Festa, you have to tip your cap to the skipper for having this group playing meaningful baseball in September.

Maybe it comes from the success in 2022 and 2024, maybe it comes from Jose Ramirez, but this group believes it can overcome things. They are resilient if nothing else.

They’ve overcome the loss of two pitchers, one of them Emmanuel Clase, perhaps the best closer in the game to a paid leave of absence as Major League Baseball investigates a gambling issue involving him and a starting pitcher in Luis Ortiz.

Yet, here they are, right in the thick of it.

All of that said, the Guardians can’t have anymore lulls now. They need to continue to win, pretty much on a nightly basis. They have 17 games remaining and even though they’ve won their last five contests, they are going to have to continue that hot streak and finish something like 14-3.

They do not have the tiebreaker against Seattle, losing four of six, and would have to sweep the Rangers in the season ending series to even things up with Texas, so they would benefit from both teams passing Houston, who the Guards took four of six from this year.

We understand for younger fans, who grew up in the Jacobs/Progressive Field era, being in contention at this time of the year is old hat, but it shouldn’t be taken for granted. Older fans, who experienced the 60’s, 70’s, and 80’s know it wasn’t always this way.

Hopefully, the front office won’t look at what has happened this year and think it will always be like this. We will get to this after the season, but this team needs help going forward and they can’t just depend on the farm system.

Although Highly Unlikely, Guards Still In It

We repeat this all the time because people think we are overly critical of the Cleveland Guardians, but we want them to be good. Nothing from a sports standpoint would give us more pleasure than to see a Cleveland player catch the last out of the World Series and trigger a celebration that is now 77 years in the making.

It still even brightens our day just a bit knowing the Guardians won last night. We have followed this franchise from the time we were six years old, and believe me, that’s a long time ago.

It seems we have written them off several times this season, but after their come from behind win against Tampa Bay last Wednesday, which brought them back to .500 at 66-66, we could still see a path to the playoffs.

On social media, we said the Guards had 30 games remaining and likely needed to go 20-10 in those contests to have a legitimate shot at the post-season. We did have one caveat, we felt with this offense, it would be very difficult to achieve.

And then, on Friday night, perhaps the most improbably win of the season. Against Seattle, a team vying for a playoff spot, just like Cleveland, the Guardians fell behind 4-0 in the first inning. They followed that by pretty much doing nothing for five innings on offense.

Then, Kyle Manzardo homered in the 6th. Nolan Jones, who was stuck on three homers before tying Wednesday’s game with one, hit another to make it 4-2. They scored again on a ground ball by Angel Martinez that sawed him off badly to make it 4-3.

And then Jones started a ninth inning winning rally with a double, some weird baserunning, and eventually Steven Kwan hit a sacrifice fly to win the game. We imagine a Mariners’ fan watching this and thinking “what the heck?”

The Guardians are still hovering around .500 even though their record, based on their runs scored and runs allowed says they should be at 61-74, which would put them well out of the race.

The league average OPS in 2025 is 721, Cleveland has two hitters, Jose Ramirez and Manzardo, over that mark. That’s it.

Ben Lively, a man who hasn’t pitched since the middle of May due to elbow surgery, still ranks 12th on the team in WAR. And Parker Messick, who has made just two starts on the season as he was just called up, is 11th.

Steven Vogt’s squad is doing it with smoke and mirrors. The team is determining the #2 and #5 spots in the batting order based on production in the past week. Jones, because he had five hits in three games last week, batted after Manzardo, a player in his first full season in the big leagues, on Sunday.

By the way, those five hits are the only hits by Jones since August 19th.

Rookie C.J. Kayfus is 0 for his last 15 and 4 for his last 31, and the organization released Carlos Santana (a move we agreed with) to get him more at bats.

Will Wilson, who was hitting under .200 since being sent down to AAA last month, was recalled when Daniel Schneemann went on paternity leave. He’s hitting .192 with a 511 OPS at the big league level.

And it’s not as though the pitching has been overwhelming either. The Guards are 8th in the AL in team ERA at 3.92 and the bullpen is nowhere near the dominant group they were in 2024.

Yet here they are. And although our brain says this team doesn’t have the horses, our heart tells us there is still a chance.

And if you grew up in the 60’s, 70’s, or 80’s, that’s progress.

The Times Should Be A-Changing For The Guardians

We talked about the Cleveland Guardians needing to do well heading into the stretch in the schedule that started this past weekend against the Texas Rangers. They had nine games against the Marlins, Braves, and Diamondbacks.

At the time, they were 61-56 and just six games behind the Tigers in the AL Central, and more importantly were just a half game behind New York for the last playoff spot in the American League.

Unfortunately, they couldn’t hold up their end of the bargain, going 3-6 in those series and then following that up by getting swept in a three-game set at Texas. Losing nine of twelve isn’t conducive to staying in a playoff chase.

So now, Steven Vogt’s crew is 12.5 behind Detroit and has fallen into third place in the Central behind the Royals, and they are now six games out in the wild card chase and behind Kansas City and the Rangers in the standings.

In a week, we will be in September and to us, they can’t be more than five games out at that point to be considered on the edge of the playoff hunt, so they are going to need to have an excellent homestand against the Rays and Mariners.

The offense had been feasting on some of the less accomplished pitching staffs in baseball, but that production ran out in the series against Atlanta and Arizona. All three National League teams on the schedule ranked near the bottom of the ERA standings, and the Guardians did put up 17 runs vs. Miami.

But the Braves held Cleveland bats to five runs in the trio of contests, and the Guardians only scored 10 runs vs. the D-Backs. Texas has the best ERA in the AL, so it shouldn’t be a surprise Steven Vogt’s crew tallied just three runs in Arlington.

We have been saying for some time now that this team only has three legitimate bats, and one of them, Steven Kwan, hasn’t been very good since the All-Star break, hitting just .231 with a .285 on base percentage.

It doesn’t take calculus to tell you if you only have three decent hitters out of nine and one of those guys isn’t hitting, a team is going to have trouble scoring runs.

If this team has any chance to pull off a winning streak, the organization shouldn’t be clinging to any hope the group currently on the roster is going to be able to put something together.

Doing that is grasping at straws looking at the best outcomes for some of these guys instead of looking at five months of numbers.

C.J. Kayfus has been solid since coming up to the majors and his 705 OPS, while not great, is better than anyone on the team not named Jose Ramirez, Kwan, or Kyle Manzardo. It’s a low bar, granted, it’s also 100 points higher than Nolan Jones.

We have seemingly heard about George Valera for years as a prospect, and he had a delayed start to the season because of injuries, but he’s hitting .278 with a 893 OPS at Columbus in 24 games, why not see what he can do?

The same is true with the bullpen, do we really need to see more of Matt Festa and Kolby Allard? Why not take a look at some arms at Columbus?

Isn’t doing the same thing over and over again and expecting a different result one of the definitions of insanity? That’s what is feels like for a supporter of the 2025 Cleveland Guardians.

Guards Need To Continue Hot Streak For Another Six Weeks

The Cleveland Guardians are very much in a race for a post-season spot. However, it will not be easy to attain. It may be trite to say, but their chances really hinge on how they play over the next few weeks.

In that time, Steven Vogt’s squad will play several teams who are either in the playoffs as of the moment or have aspirations of getting there. That stretch starts next weekend with a series in Texas, who sit just three games behind Cleveland.

Then comes Tampa Bay, four games behind the Guards, followed by Boston, who is three games ahead of Cleveland and currently in possession of a playoff berth and Seattle, just ahead of the Red Sox.

We are lifelong fans of the Guardians and despite being critical of the team at times (usually directed at ownership), we would like nothing more to see Vogt and the players overcome the odds and play meaningful baseball in October.

Our heart says it’s possible, but our head says it’s not likely.

To us, it feels like this group has succeeded using smoke and mirrors all season long. The team’s won/lost record based on the number of runs they scored and allowed is 57-635, six games below the Guardians’ actual record of 63-59.

That six-game difference would indicate a lot of luck has worked in favor of the team.

We look at the offensive numbers. Despite scoring a lot of runs since their 10 game losing streak, Cleveland still ranks third from the bottom in the American League in runs scored. They are second worst in getting on base, third worst in slugging percentage, and tied for 12th in home runs.

Everyone wants to talk about the pitching factory in Cleveland, and over the years it has churned out a lot of good ones, but this year’s staff isn’t among the best in the league. They rank 8th in ERA, above the league average, but it’s still 3.89. Now, it is kind of jumbled and with a great six weeks to finish, they could rise to as high as 2nd or 3rd, but some of the ancillary numbers aren’t great either.

The Guardians have walked the 4th most hitters in the AL. Control has been an issue for several pitchers, like Gavin Williams, who leads the league in bases on balls, and Joey Cantillo seems to have control issues regularly.

They are around league average in striking hitters out. The one area they have been good is they have kept the ball in the park, allowing the fourth fewest homers in the AL.

The Guardians have already been on a pretty good roll, winning 23 of their last 33 contests. They have 40 games remaining, so can they extend this streak to a point where they win 50 of their last 72?

Again, anything is possible, but they are really going to have to continue to play at the rate they’ve been at since the losing streak for the rest of the season.

We saw the Tigers go 47-28 last season after July 4th. Heck, last year the Guardians won 38 of their first 57 games.

So, it is possible. And we will continue to hope for it to happen. That’s why they play the games, and as Terry Francona (and others) always said, you can only win the game you are playing today.

Yes, the Guardians have played well over the last month or so. The reality is they are going to have to play even better down the stretch, meaning the offense needs more players swinging it, and the pitching staff needs to be dominant.

Let’s all collectively cross our fingers.

With A Tough Stretch Coming Up, Guardians Need These Players To Keep It Going.

There are just 45 games remaining in the Major League Baseball season for the Cleveland Guardians, and the schedule is going to ramp up one more time starting a week from Friday.

Starting with three on the road against Texas, Steven Vogt’s crew will have 20 games in a row against solid opponents. After coming home from the Lone Star state, the Guardians have a six game homestand against Tampa (57-62) and Seattle (66-53 and currently in a playoff spot).

That is followed by a trip to Boston (65-54 and a playoff team) and four in Tampa, before coming home for four more with the Royals (58-60).

Continued success against those teams will bode well for the Guardians heading into the homestretch.

But the team is going to need some contributions from players who either haven’t had an opportunity or haven’t performed up to standards to date. We would like to see these guys step up.

First and foremost, they need Tanner Bibee to start pitching like he did in his first two seasons with Cleveland. His ERA is those two seasons were 2.98 and 3.47. This year, he is a full run worse at 4.60. His strikeouts are down, and his walks are up. He’s already tied his career high of 22 home runs allowed.

Gavin Williams, Slade Cecconi, and even Logan Allen have been pretty consistent for Vogt, but right now, Bibee seems to have that one inning he can’t reel in. If he can give the Guardians four solid starters down the stretch, it would be huge for the rotation and for the bullpen, as he would provide someone else who can get deeper into games.

Erik Sabrowski and Nic Enright are two guys who must continue to pitch well out of the bullpen. Sabrowski got a late start to the season, but since being activated has a 1.15 ERA and 23 strikeouts in 15.2 innings, allowing just eight hits. With Tim Herrin struggling in 2025, Sabrowski has become the left-hander Vogt leans on late in games.

The only other lefty, Kolby Allard is more of a long man, an innings eater. He’s been very effective (2.63 ERA in 48 innings), but we would guess the skipper doesn’t want him in a high leverage situation against the opponents’ best left-handed hitter.

Enright, a righty, has a 1.96 ERA over 23 innings, and is gaining the manager’s trust in late innings.

With Hunter Gaddis not pitching at the level he did a year ago, and Emmanuel Clase under suspension, these two guys have to continue to do well out of the Cleveland bullpen.

We saved the most difficult thing for last, another bat to step up. C.J. Kayfus has made an impact in his brief time here but needs to keep it going. He already has five RBI, one less than Johnathan Rodriguez (in 42 less plate appearances) and the same number as Austin Hedges.

He also has four extra base hits, the same number as Will Wilson and Jhonkensy Noel had with the team.

But they could use someone else to contribute regularly. Vogt has been platooning Daniel Schneemann and Angel Martinez in CF and having success, and Brayan Rocchio is hitting .293 (737 OPS) over the last 28 days.

Having those trends continue could pay big dividends in this upcoming stretch.

Too Bad Ownership Didn’t Believe In This Year’s Guardians

The Cleveland Guardians have come roaring out of the All-Star break. winning 14 of their 20 games, and they’ve won 9 of their last 10, including a three-game sweep of the Mets on the road.

Steven Vogt continues to say his team is resilient and that’s an understatement. After a 10-game losing streak at the end of June, most people thought this team was done, but Cleveland has put together a 21-7 record since then.

Yes, the schedule got easier, but don’t forget, in addition to the sweep in New York, the Guardians also took all three games against the division leading Astros too.

Vogt has this team believing in themselves. It’s too bad the front office, and we mean ownership here, didn’t share that feeling.

The Guardians made two moves at the trade deadline, and both were basically done to shed salary. dealing the balance of the $10 million owed to Shane Bieber and the rest of the $6 million owed to oft-injured reliever Paul Sewald.

To be fair, neither pitcher had helped the Guardians to date, and the front office did net a solid prospect for the former Cy Young Award winner, and much like last off-season, highly paid players were moved and very little salary was picked up in their place.

Cleveland did sign reliever Carlos Hernandez, who was DFA’d by the Tigers. FYI, he’s making $1.16 million this year.

The point is this team, which as of today, sits just a half game out of a playoff spot, and has closed the gap behind the division leading Tigers to six games, didn’t get any help at the deadline, and they still need some added offense and the bullpen could’ve used another arm, especially with the suspension of Emmanuel Clase.

We have seen a lot of statistics talking about the Guardians’ offense since the losing skein and how it ranks among the best in baseball since then. However, it is still the third worst in the AL, ahead of just Chicago and Kansas City.

In that span, they’ve also faced three of the worst pitching staffs in the game, the A’s, Orioles, and Rockies. They also have only three batters with OPS+ over 100 in Jose Ramirez, Steven Kwan, and Kyle Manzardo, although Daniel Schneemann is very close at 99.

They finally called up C.J. Kayfus from AAA and he has helped so far, but he had only 23 at bats.

And let’s not forget the team still has Nolan Jones on the roster, and his playing time seems to be shrinking.

Not doing anything to help the relief corps after the Clase suspension might wind up being a bigger problem. Even with Hunter Gaddis not pitching like he did a year ago, you had to feel good if Cleveland had a lead after six innings with Gaddis, Cade Smith, and Clase ready to go.

To their credit, Erik Sabrowski (1.15 ERA, 23 K in 15.2 innings) and Nic Enright (1.96 ERA in 23 innings) have done well, but again, it still wouldn’t have hurt to get some relief help.

We would like to imagine that Vogt has a poster of Paul Dolan in the clubhouse and instead of tearing a piece of Rachel Phelps’ clothing off, they do something to it after every win to show the owner he should have had faith in the team.

That isn’t true, but it shows again that profits mean more than wins to Dolan. Oh, and by the way, 1948.

Guardians’ Starting Pitching With Surprises

The strength of the Cleveland Guardians’ organization is developing pitchers and even in a up and down 2025 season, that has still been the case.

They are hovering around the .500 mark with an offense that ranks near the bottom of the American League in most statistical categories, but the pitching staff still has an above average ERA at 3.87, compared to the league average of 4.04.

However, how they have got there is a different story. We all know that one of the starters, Luis Ortiz, acquired from the Pirates over the winter has been out for about two months now under an MLB investigation.

If not for a case of food poisoning, Tanner Bibee would have been the Guardians’ Opening Day starter, but because he couldn’t go, Ben Lively took the mound. Unfortunately, Lively went down with an elbow injury that needed Tommy John surgery following his start on May 12th.

You can make the argument that Bibee has been the most disappointing pitcher on the team, non-suspension related. His hits/innings pitched has increased by a hit per game from a year ago, and his walk rate is also up while his strikeout rate is down, and his ERA is up over a run per game from last season.

He’s also giving up a ton more homers. Last year, for the entire season, he allowed 22 long balls. This year, he ranks 6th in the AL allowing 21 of them, and 13 of those have been with men on base.

We aren’t giving up on Bibee, but he needs to get back to throwing more strikes, getting ahead in the count more often and keeping the ball in the park.

Gavin Williams was the #2 starter, and by and large, he has been solid this year with a 3.33 ERA, a number which drops to 2.92 since May 1st. He’s only allowed 95 hits in 116.1 innings with 117 strikeouts.

His problem? Walks. He leads the AL in that negative category. Besides putting men on base, it limits how long he can stay in games. We have always thought Williams has the look of a #1 starter, and we still think that. If he can command the strike zone better, the Guardians have an anchor for their rotation.

And then we have Slade Cecconi. We made fun of Cecconi’s numbers in Arizona, where he compiled a 6.06 ERA, and because he was the return for Josh Naylor, who of course hit 30 HR and knocked in 100 for the Guards last year.

But to date, we were wrong. First, Cecconi is kind of a throwback in that he doesn’t strike out batters, but lately just keep inducing weak contact. That has allowed him to pitch at least six innings in his last five starts, allowing three runs or less in four of them.

He’s only fanned more than five in one of his last seven starts. We understand that irritates the new age fans who only value strikeouts, but if he keeps doing what he’s been doing over the last six weeks, he will be quite fine.

The great Bill James said a good pitcher allows less hits than innings pitched and strikes out twice as many hitters as he walks. Cecconi has done that. You know who else has? Logan Allen.

Allen seems to still have people irritated by his poor season a year ago (5.73 ERA), but that number is down to 4.06 this year and he has given Steven Vogt six innings per start since the beginning of June. He’s been solid and for a 4th starter, that’s not bad.

The starting pitching has still been good even though the guy who was supposed to be the anchor, Bibee, hasn’t pitched up to his standards. At the worst, these guys keep the Guardians in the game, which isn’t easy considering the offense output of the team.

Any Deadline Move Needs To Help The Offense

The Cleveland Guardians have rebounded nicely from their 10-game losing streak a few weeks ago by winning 11 of their next 14 contests.

The offense has perked up scoring 4.5 runs per game since July 1st after averaging less than three a game in June. Part of that is the schedule. Cleveland hitters have faced two of the worst pitching staffs in the American League as of late (Athletics and Orioles), and another that ranks in the bottom third in the league in the White Sox.

Despite the recent surge, the Guardians still rank 13th in the AL in scoring. That’s third worst.

So, if the Guards want to make a run at a post-season spot, the front office needs to address the hitting.

Right now, the league average OPS is 718 and to date, Cleveland has three hitters who are above that figure, and we are sure everyone knows they are Jose Ramirez, Steven Kwan, and Kyle Manzardo.

We also think to have a solid batting order on most nights, a team needs at least six, and hopefully seven hitters can put together solid at bats. Right now, Steven Vogt doesn’t have that luxury.

In Thursday’s loss to Baltimore, the only game the Guardians dropped in the series, Vogt used Will Wilson (since sent back to AAA) and Austin Hedges, because Bo Naylor needed a day off.

Wilson and Hedges are terrible hitters. And since you only get 27 outs in a game, you have to figure the pair will account for 6 of those, two innings worth, meaning you better get some runs from the other 21 outs.

As a comparison, let’s look at the Houston Astros, who rank 7th in the AL in runs scored. They have six batters with over 250 plate appearances and OPS over the league average. The Los Angeles Angels are eighth in runs scored and they also have six hitters with that many plate appearances and an OPS over 718.

One more team to look at, the Yankees, who lead the AL in runs scored, have seven guys that qualify under this criterion.

To be fair, Angel Martinez has been hot, and his OPS is up to 687. We like that he is showing more pop, but our concern is his walk to strikeout ratio, which is currently at 13 walks vs. 69 strikeouts.

That’s not the profile of a good offensive player, but if he can develop some patience and strike zone judgment, he could fill one of the three spots needed.

The question is will the front office go out and get a solid bat this week before the deadline. They have prospects at the A level that could draw some interest to a team out of contention, but would the organization be willing to do that?

We saw folks on social media heralding the return of Gabriel Arias from the IL, but he’s a below average bat, his 658 OPS is below Daniel Schneemann.

And speaking of Santana, it appears he is showing that Father Time remains undefeated, but knowing how the organization feels about him, we ask if the team has the stomach to move on from him?

We hate to depend on a rookie, but we would like to see if C. J. Kayfus can be more productive than the veteran.

And we will repeat, the profile of this front office is they do not add to stay in contention, but on the other hand, do they have anyone another team will be interested in come Thursday?

We know about guys like Gavin Williams, Tanner Bibee, etc., but the Guardians are not in a position to deal them. And we don’t think teams have an interest in Lane Thomas either.

If the Guardians want to stay in contention for a spot in the tournament, they need to add to the offense. They simply don’t have enough hitting for the last two months.