Guardians facing must-win game tonight against White Sox after pitching plans went out window 

Coming into Monday it seemed like the Guardians had done everything right when it came to their pitching plans. Joey Cantillo did well as a bulk reliever on Saturday and Tanner Bibee pitched a gem on Sunday after having his start moved up. 

Then Monday’s game happened. While Gavin Williams didn’t pitch horrible in Cleveland’s 7-3 loss to the White Sox (two earned runs allowed in five innings), it wasn’t the kind of start the Guardians envisioned from him when they shuffled their pitching staff around so he could be on the mound Monday. 

The best laid plans, man. 

Foster Griffin needs to pick the Guardians up tonight against the White Sox

Wiliams’ relatively short start meant the Guardians’ bullpen needed to cover four innings behind him, and we got the double-whammy of it being four ineffective innings. 

Tim Herrin allowed three runs in 2/3 of an inning in his worst appearance of a month, and Daniel Espino followed that up by giving up a two-run homer to Miguel Vargas.

Slade Cecconi and Connor Brogdon helped eat some innings at the end of the game, but it still was far more bullpen usage than anyone would have liked to see in a game that came with so much rotation tweaking. 

And it wasn’t like Williams was bad. He kept the White Sox off the board for the first five innings, and all of their runs against him came after Herrin had entered the game. The big blow came via Tristan Peters’ 18-pitch at-bat that ended in a walk and brought Herrin into the game. 

That sets up today’s game where Foster Griffin will get a chance to etch his name into Guardians’ lore with a strong start. 

Griffin’s been relatively steady throughout his Guardians tenure outside of his disastrous start his last time out, but he could put that in the rearview with a solid outing tonight.

He’s gone at least five innings in five of his seven starts with Cleveland, and the Guardians are going to need (at least) five innings out of him tonight after yesterday’s game. 

The good news is the Guardians didn’t need to use any of their high-leverage relievers, so manager Stephen Vogt can afford to be aggressive in his bullpen moves if need be. 

On the other side, the White Sox are going with Davis Martin, who struggled in August before going on the injured list, but has allowed just one run across two September starts. 

Even if Monday’s loss was a deflating start to the Guardians’ biggest series of the year, the Guardians still have a chance to hold the division lead by picking up wins in the final two games of the series. 

Williams couldn’t hold up his end of the deal; now it’s Griffin’s turn.

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