Guardians salvage split with Rays, inch closer to clinching playoff berth

This past weekend's series with the Tampa Bay Rays did not begin particularly well for the Cleveland Guardians. Dropping two games to a Rays team that is far out of the playoff picture in their division and pretty much irrelevant in the Wild Card hunt is far from ideal. The good news is that the Guardians did not dwell on these losses, putting them behind them in order to focus on the task at hand. Winning ballgames.

Cleveland would go on to win the next two games in somewhat comfortable fashion and earned a much-needed four-game split with the Rays. Even though splitting a four-game series with a team that owns a -64 run-differential does not seem like much of an accomplishment, the alternative, losing a series to a team with this description, would be a major cause of concern for the Guardians' chances of moving forward.

There is another factor at play here as well. Cleveland's lead in the American League Central was able to increase to four on Sunday, resulting in their magic number for winning the division decreasing to nine and clinching a spot in the 2024 MLB Postseason to just four. It has been clear for quite some time that the Guardians were going to make the playoffs and now it is only a matter of time before it becomes a reality.

Perhaps more importantly, the split with Tampa Bay results in the Guardians maintaining their multiple-game lead in the division. Cleveland holds a four-game lead over second-place Kansas City and a 6.5-game lead over third-place Minnesota. Considering the Guardians are set to begin a four-game set with the Twins on Monday, having this large of a buffer zone at this time is a very welcome development. If, for some reason, the Guardians struggle and lose this series, they will still be ahead of the Twins, and depending on how things play out for the Royals against Detroit, Cleveland could still have a relatively comfortable margin for error as the season winds down. With that being said, hopefully, it does come down to relying on the Tigers to keep the Royals at bay, and Cleveland can take care of business against a Twins team that is not particularly good in any way.