The Guardians’ back-breaking flaws were on full display in loss to Cardinals

The Cleveland Guardians’ entering play today with a record of 10-8 is incredibly impressive. But just because they have an impressive record doesn’t mean that they’re a perfect team. Far from it, in fact. 

Their offense is still a bit hit-or-miss, their closer has allowed a run in five of his nine outings this season and their starting pitching is a bit top heavy. 

And while all of those things are relatively normal occurrences across the marathon of a 162-game season, you don’t want to be in a situation where they’re all happening at once, let alone in the same game. 

That was the exact case on Wednesday, however, as the Guardians squandered multiple chances in an extra-innings loss to the Cardinals. 

The Guardians have plenty of imprefections they need to fix

The Guardians got off to a fast start thanks to a towering home run from José Ramírez, who has hit .375 with two home runs and three RBI over his last six games after starting the season on a cold streak. 

From there both teams traded solo home runs, with Daniel Schnemann leaving the yard in the second inning and Cardinals rookie JJ Wetherholt smashing the first of his two home runs in the following inning. 

What followed seemed like the classic ‘Guards Ball’ game, as Steven Kwan made a great diving catch to start a double play in the sixth inning before George Valera and Angel Martínez staked the Guardians to a three-run lead in the eighth with back-to-back RBI doubles. 

Normally that kind of lead is more than enough for the back-end of Cleveland’s bullpen. But it wasn’t enough on Monday. 

After JJ Wetherholt cut into the lead with a two-run homer off Erik Sabrowski in the eighth inning, Cade Smith cruised through the start of the ninth inning before Masyn Winn reached on an error from Juan Brito that resulted in Yohel Pozo roping a game-tying double in the right-field gap. 

The Guardians were mercifully put out of their misery an inning later on a go-ahead scarcity fly from Nathan Church that was set up by a wild pitch from Tim Herrin. 

So, to recap, the Guardians blew a late lead thanks to a two-run homer from a player they could have drafted two summers ago, a crucial error from a rookie who struggles on defense and another blown save from Cade Smith. 

Other than that, Mrs. Lincoln… 

Again, it’s a long season. There are going to be spells where teams don’t play well, and the Guardians aren’t immune to that. 

But last night’s late-game struggles didn’t happen in a vacuum. While the Guardians still have a winning record, a lot of their success has been because they’ve gotten otherworldly performances from some players on their roster and not much from everyone else. 

After the game, Stephen Vogt said the Guardians “needed to finish” the game. Although that hasn’t been a problem for the Guardians in the past two seasons, it seems like it could become an alarming trend this year. 

Add us as a preferred source on Google

Follow