Are Brayan Rocchio and Angel Martínez everyday players for the Guardians?

The Guardians’ win over the Orioles on Tuesday was a showcase of how Brayan Rocchio and Angel Martínez can positively impact the Guardians. 

Martínez served as the team’s spark plug at the top of the lineup with three hits and a big double, while Rocchio created some production at the bottom of the lineup with a big base hit and sacrifice bunt, 

While they still both have their warts as players and haven’t fully established themselves as building blocks for the future, it’s games like Tuesday that serve as reminders of what kind of player they can be at the major league level. 

Are Brayan Rocchio and Angel Martínez everyday players for the Guardians? 

Although Martínez has been on the Guardians’ MLB roster since he was called up in April, he’s emerged from a mid-summer slump to become one of the most important hitters in the Guardians’ lineup. 

Martínez has hit .319 in 18 games in July, and has been supernova since the All-Star Break. He’s racked up a hit in all five of Cleveland’s games in the second half, and has recorded two three games. 

He’s become so much of a pest that Orioles manager Tony Mansolino spent a portion of his postgame press conference talking about how they need to get him out.

“We’ve got to get Angel out,” Mansolino said.

The No. 2 hole had been a black hole for the Guardians for most of the year, but Martínez is starting to turn that around. It’s not a coincidence that his hot streak has coincided with José Ramírez also going supernova. 

And then there’s Rocchio producing at the bottom of the lineup. 

It’s hard to believe, but at one point Rocchio was thought of as a key piece of the Cleveland Guardians’ future. His prospect profile kept growing after the team signed him as an international free agent in 2017, and it reached a fever pitch in 2022 when multiple publications ranked him as a top-100 prospect. 

While his freefall has been hard in the three years since, he’s looked like a new player since being recalled from Triple-A earlier this year.

The Guardians demoted Rocchio at the beginning of May after he hit just .165 through 37 games, but he’s slashed .288/.321/.481 with a home run and 11 RBI in 18 games since getting called up. 

He’s also provided his trademark defense at shortstop, and even laid down a sacrifice bunt on Wednesday to boot. 

Gabriel Arias provided the Guardians with some serviceable play at shortstop in Rocchio’s absence, but Arias provides a ton of value off the bench as a utility bat. If Rocchio keeps this up, he should stick at shortstop once Arias returns from his injured list stint. 

Any Guardians team that has Ramírez has a chance to make the postseason, but the best teams during Ramírez's tenure have had solid complementary players who have taken some of the pressure off his shoulders.

As of now, Martínez and Rocchio are doing just that, and it's helped the Guardians work their way back into the postseason picture.