Stats show Jose Ramirez homered off an impossible pitch to send Guardians to ALCS

Impossible. It was impossible for Jose Ramirez to top what he did in Game 4 in Chicago. It was impossible for Jose Ramirez to homer on the pitch he yanked out of the park for the only two runs of Game 5. It was impossible for the Cleveland Guardians to overcome a 2-0 series deficit at home, with the White Sox taking the field for an inevitable first-clinch-in-106-years-on-hallowed-ground twice this week.

Yet here we are.

The Guardians passed the White Sox by that same familiar refrain on Saturday night, formally reversing the meaning of "2-0" with one lone smash in the night. After Sean Burke and Gavin Williams matched zeroes through the first three innings of the decisive Game 5, Ramirez strode to the plate with one man on and turned a 2-2 count into the only two runs of the game.

He did so by becoming a more effective digger than Tom Cruise, scooping a Burke breaker from the edge of the dirt over the right field wall.

Winning the division allowed the hamate to heal. No bye has ever been more important.

Jose Ramirez's game-winning home run for Guardians was as impossible as we thought

To the naked eye, it looked insane.

To the stat-trained eye, it was confirmed insane.

It's the lowest pitch Ramirez has ever drilled for a home run. It's the lowest pitch ever drilled for a postseason home run since 2008 (at least).

Ramirez's impossible home run was all Cleveland needed. Gavin Williams locked in tremendously after his Game 4 appearance, striking out 12 and looking no-hit-ready for an extended period of time. All told, with Hunter Gaddis and Cade Smith's contributions in tow, the Guardians struck out 21 White Sox altogether, breaking their own postseason record (19 in Game 3).

When push came to shove, the swing-and-miss that dominated the White Sox offense all year destroyed them. It almost represented a symbolic changing of the guard. The days of not caring about whiffs are over. The Tampa Bay Rays and Cleveland Guardians are moving on, making contact and agitating. The three-true-outcomes White Sox are going home.

And Ramirez, making contact on a pitch at the edge of the dirt and finding paydirt, was as impossibly emblematic of that transition as anyone.

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