Keeping this Cleveland Guardians season in perspective

The Cleveland Guardians remain as streaky a team as ever – will they get back on track this weekend against the Royals?

If someone told you at the beginning of the season that the Cleveland Guardians would be a .500 ball club at the halfway point, you would have taken that, right?

That’s where the Guardians currently sit, an even 40-40. But a baseball season is all about trying to keep things in perspective, which isn’t always easy when your team is struggling and just got swept by the relatively lowly (but playing better as of late) Detroit Tigers in a four-game series.

When the Guardians lost seven in a row early in the season to the likes of the Angels and Yankees (the first time), things seemed pretty bleak. Just as it felt like the sky was the limit for the team after a 7-2 road trip in June that saw the Guardians sweep the Colorado Rockies and win series agains the Los Angeles Dodgers and Minnesota Twins.

Such is life for the youngest team in Major League Baseball – and Triple-A to boot. And despite the Guardians’ recent struggles, this has been an exciting season that should give fans plenty of hope for the future. Just to be at the .500 mark, no doubt in the playoff race, is an accomplishment in and of itself. The Guardians remain a streaky, often frustrating, team with an oft-changing identity, but that’s just to be expected at this point.

So Where Do the Cleveland Guardians Go From Here?

The best thing about baseball is that every day provides a new opportunity to reset. And the Guardians will attempt to do so against a favorable opponent in the Kansas City Royals, who sit at 30-51 and have the worst team ERA in the American League.

Additionally, the news of the team promoting Nolan Jones could provide the spark the lineup has been looking for while giving the Guardians a chance to evaluate what they have in their former top prospect.

Ultimately, this Guardians season has always been about what the team has in its young prospects and identifying who could ultimately make up the core group of players for years to come. However, if there was ever a time for Cleveland to turn things around and get back to their winning ways in 2022, this weekend would be it.