Could this veteran Guardians reliever be turning a corner?

Coming into the 2025 MLB season, it looked as Paul Sewald would get the first crack at pitching in the middle innings for the Guardians after the team signed him for $7 million in the offseason.

But, three months into the season, that hasn’t been the case, as Sewald’s only managed to throw 11 2/3 innings this year due to a high-grade strain that he suffered in April. 

Instead, the Guardians have filled those innings with Matt Festa, a veteran reliever who opened the season in Triple-A with the Rangers. 

That decision has mostly been a win so far this season.

Could Matt Festa be turning a corner?

Festa’s journey with the Guardians started in April when they acquired him from the Rangers in exchange for cash at the end of April after Texas failed to exercise his opt-out clause. 

Two days later, Festa was in Cleveland’s bullpen, where he’s been ever since. 

Although he opened his Guardians tenure with two scoreless innings across his first two appearances, Festa blew up in his third appearance with the team when he allowed three runs in 2/3 of an inning against the Nationals. 

He rebounded from that by tossing 7 1/3 scoreless innings across his next six outings before allowing two runs in 1 1/3 innings against the Dodgers at the end of May.

He followed that up by posting a 2.35 ERA in his next 7 2/3 innings before allowing two runs in 1/3 of an inning in the Guardians loss to the Giants last Thursday. All that amounts to a 4.19 ERA in 19 1/3 innings. 

Festa is one of the more intriguing arms in the Guardians’ bullpen. At 32, he’s not a young prospect, but he’s also not a finished product. 

He burst into MLB in 2018 with the Mariners, where he posted a 2.16 ERA in 8 1/3 innings. He spent parts of four seasons with Seattle (and had a 4.32 ERA in 93 2/3 innings) before they cut him loose midway through the 2023 season. 

He briefly saw some MLB action with the Mets in 2024 before finishing the season with the Rangers. He spent some time in the offseason with the Cubs before going back to Texas, which set up Cleveland’s move to acquire him. 

And while his last outing left a bit to be desired, it doesn’t change the fact that he’s the perfect bridge reliever for the Guardians. As mentioned above, heading into the season it looked like those innings would be filled by Sewald and Jakob Junis, but Sewald hasn’t pitched in two months and Junis has a 4.05 ERA across 33 1/3 innings. 

That, coupled with injuries to Andrew Walters and Erik Sobrowski, led to the Guardians taking a flier on Festa. So far, that decision has been a win. 

Last year, Pedro Avila stepped up to help the Guardians’ bullpen; this year, the Guardians have replaced that production with Festa and Kolby Allard (1.95 ERA in 27 2/3 innings). 

Festa doesn’t have enough appearances to qualify for the Baseball Savant leaderboards, but his chase rate of 32.8% and his barrel rate of 3.8% would be in the top percentile. He doesn’t have incredible velocity, but he has a boomerang sweeper and a deceptive delivery. 

While that leaves him with less room for error than some other pitchers (call it the Nick Sandlin effect), his stuff can be extremely hard to hit when he’s on. 

The Guardians' acquisition of Festa in April didn't generate many headlines, but it's been a big win for the team so far this year.