Guardians drop three of four in Los Angeles as their September fade continues

The Cleveland Guardians continue to limp their way through September as their playoff hopes have disappeared, and it is now a countdown until the season is over. 

Cleveland went out to Los Angeles with their slim but still existent chances to remain relevant in the American League Central conversation. As small as their chances were, they are now nearly eliminated. This is thanks in part to dropping three of four games to the Angels in what should have been a very winnable series, considering they were without their two best players, Mike Trout and Shohei Ohtani. 

The ironic part of this deflating trip west is that it was the Guardians who claimed three of the Angels’ cast-offs not that long ago as a last second grasp by the front office in an attempt to appear to be “going for it”.  Well, as the saying goes, it was too little too late. 

There is also the fact that for a team that has been offensively challenged for most of the season, they claimed three pitchers, while their additions to the batting order included Kole Calhoun and Ramon Laureano. While Calhoun has performed better than anyone could have realistically expected, and Laureano is playing fine in his role, this was a team that could have used impact bats if they were serious about making a run at a very fraudulent Minnesota Twins team. 

The most frustrating part of all of this is that this is yet another year in the prime of Jose Ramirez’s career that is going to waste. There are a finite number of years where Jose is going to perform at this level, and this front office seems content with their “threading the needle” philosophy. This is not only an insult to the fanbase but a middle finger to their best player. If this team is not going to be serious about contending while they have arguably the best player in franchise history on a team-friendly deal, then what are they doing?