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Here are the reasons why the Guardians will win over 100 games in 2023. Bear with me.
Last season, after taking a few months to figure out who should be playing and where they should be hitting, as well as getting their bullpen straightened out, the Guardians finished 24-6, then went 4-3 in the post-season against Tampa and New York. They finished the season as one of the top four or five teams in baseball.
The Guardians started the season with Myles Straw leading off and Franmil Reyes hitting cleanup. It was a disaster in both cases. By the middle of the season Kwan was leading off, Reyes had been replaced mostly by Oscar Gonzalez, and Straw was hitting 9th. Big improvement.
As a leadoff hitter Straw hit .201 with on OBP of .294 in 229 at-bats. After Straw was moved to 9th, Kwan hit .311 with a .379 OBP in the #1 spot. Next year Kwan will lead off the entire season.
The Guardians’ designated hitters last year ranked 29th in OPS, an embarrassing .587. Franmil had about 250 AB’s as a DH and was a big part of that with a .213 average and 104 K’s. Owen Miller hit .176 in his 51 AB’s as a DH. That’s 300 very unproductive DH at-bats.
Next year with the acquisition of Josh Bell, Josh Naylor will get most of the at-bats at DH. Naylor hit .256/.771 last year and should hit much better this year between the shift being abolished and being a year further away from his leg injury.
I also expect a much better season out of Straw, who hit .313 in September after changing his approach. Straw stopped taking so many strikes and started attacking the first good pitch he saw, pulling the ball in some cases instead of slapping everything to right field. The results were obvious and immediate. Next year he’ll start the season with that approach and I expect he’ll have numbers similar to the .262/.665 he put up with the Astros in 2021 or maybe even the .285/.739 with the Indians the same year.
Jose Ramirez was hitting with a thumb injury most of the season, an injury that required surgery.
[Jose Ramirez] tore the ulnar collateral ligament in his right thumb at some point before Cleveland’s road trip to Colorado, Los Angeles and Minnesota in mid-June….Over his final 98 games, Ramírez hit .264 with a .763 OPS, 13 home runs and 64 RBI. He struck out 63 times and walked just 35 while essentially batting one-handed from the left side. - Joe Noga
When that road trip started on June 14 Jose was hitting .292/1.030 with 13 home runs in 167 at-bats. From June 15 on he hit 16 home runs in 434 at-bats, so the injury definitely affected his ability to drive the ball. Assuming he can avoid a similar injury next year his production should be significantly higher.
Oscar Gonzalez hit .296/.789 in 91 games. Assuming he’ll play more like 150 next year this should also boost the offense.
Will Brennan hit .357/.900 in a small sample of 42 AB’s, but he has a chance to also increase the offensive output. Last year Benson, Jones, and Palacios combined for about 250 mostly unproductive at-bats (.235 combined BA). Gonzalez and Brennan should get those at-bats this year.
So…between a more productive Jose Ramirez, a more productive Myles Straw, Kwan hitting leadoff all season, a full year of Oscar Gonzalez, and a lot more production from the DH position, the Guardians should score far more runs than last year, and that’s not including any additional production from the catching position, which had a line of .180/.530 last year. They’ll probably sign somebody who can do better than that.
What would more runs mean to the win-loss record?
The Guardians were 61-5 this year when scoring five runs or more. Obviously they lost some games by scores like 8-2 where even if they scored five runs they would have still lost. But I found 32 losses where the opponent scored four runs or fewer, meaning five runs would have won the game for the Guardians. There were also several games where the opponents scored exactly five runs and the G’s lost. So more offense would definitely result in quite a few more wins, and there are several reasons to believe the offense will be much better.
If even eight of those 32 losses where the opponent failed to score five runs could be turned into wins the Guardians would be a 100-win team.
As for the pitching, the top three starters were nails, although it took a few weeks to ramp them up after the lockout and shortened spring training.
Aaron Civale got off to a horrible start, allowing 27 runs in 31 innings in April and May. The lockout seemed to affect him more than anyone since he depends on impeccable command of multiple pitches. The rest of the season he had a 3.55 ERA despite three separate stints on the IL, each lasting 3-4 weeks. With a full spring training this season I expect Aaron to pick up where he left off. Whether he can stay healthy is the question.
The bullpen is what I’m really excited about. James Karinchak was injured to start last season and his first game was July 4. Pitching only half the season he had a 2.08 ERA and took over Bryan Shaw’s spot as the set-up man. Shaw had an ERA of 5.40. This year we’ll have Karinchak right from the start.
Trevor Stephan started the season as a middle reliever but was moved up and by the second half was regularly pitching in high leverage situations. He finished with a 2.69 ERA.
Nick Sandlin had a 3.66 ERA as of July 5. From then on he pitched 25 innings, allowing 12 hits, 3 earned runs, and a 1.08 ERA. He really came on strong after being sent down to work on his command.
Eli Morgan had a mid-season hiccup but in his last 18.2 innings allowed 10 hits, 2 earned runs, and a 0.96 ERA.
Cody Morris got his first appearance on Sep. 2, allowing 2 runs in 2 innings. From there on out he pitched 23.3 innings with a 1.52 ERA. I think he’s got a great chance to take over Plesac’s spot in the rotation.
The bullpen should be better with Shaw gone and Karinchak available from the start. Also, Sandlin and Morgan finished very strong and should pick up where they left off. We still have Clase, Stephan, and Hentges, who were fantastic. In Hentges’ last 15.1 innings (Sep and Oct) he allowed 4 hits, 0 runs, and struck out 20. He looked like Andrew Miller the last five weeks. The growth in Hentges, Sandlin, Morgan, and Stephan was extremely impressive.
After starting 19-24 (May 29) the Guardians finished 73-46, which projects to a 99-win season. - Joe Noga
There’s no reason they should start 19-24 this year since Straw and Reyes won’t be hitting leadoff and cleanup, the starters won’t be dealing with a short spring training, Bell and Gonzalez will be in the lineup, and Karinchak won’t be injured and Shaw won’t be pitching the 8th innings. Cody Morris may be starting or at least will take Shaw’s spot in the pen. Bieber will be in a contract year and not coming off an arm injury. Straw won’t hit .221.
Finally, the shortened basepaths will allow the Guardians to use their excellent team speed to steal even more bases. The Guardians were third in baseball with 119 steals last year. They should blow that out of the water.
I see no reason the Guardians won’t win 100 games other than injuries to multiple starters and/or Jose Ramirez.
Last season, after taking a few months to figure out who should be playing and where they should be hitting, as well as getting their bullpen straightened out, the Guardians finished 24-6, then went 4-3 in the post-season against Tampa and New York. They finished the season as one of the top four or five teams in baseball.
The Guardians started the season with Myles Straw leading off and Franmil Reyes hitting cleanup. It was a disaster in both cases. By the middle of the season Kwan was leading off, Reyes had been replaced mostly by Oscar Gonzalez, and Straw was hitting 9th. Big improvement.
As a leadoff hitter Straw hit .201 with on OBP of .294 in 229 at-bats. After Straw was moved to 9th, Kwan hit .311 with a .379 OBP in the #1 spot. Next year Kwan will lead off the entire season.
The Guardians’ designated hitters last year ranked 29th in OPS, an embarrassing .587. Franmil had about 250 AB’s as a DH and was a big part of that with a .213 average and 104 K’s. Owen Miller hit .176 in his 51 AB’s as a DH. That’s 300 very unproductive DH at-bats.
Next year with the acquisition of Josh Bell, Josh Naylor will get most of the at-bats at DH. Naylor hit .256/.771 last year and should hit much better this year between the shift being abolished and being a year further away from his leg injury.
I also expect a much better season out of Straw, who hit .313 in September after changing his approach. Straw stopped taking so many strikes and started attacking the first good pitch he saw, pulling the ball in some cases instead of slapping everything to right field. The results were obvious and immediate. Next year he’ll start the season with that approach and I expect he’ll have numbers similar to the .262/.665 he put up with the Astros in 2021 or maybe even the .285/.739 with the Indians the same year.
Jose Ramirez was hitting with a thumb injury most of the season, an injury that required surgery.
[Jose Ramirez] tore the ulnar collateral ligament in his right thumb at some point before Cleveland’s road trip to Colorado, Los Angeles and Minnesota in mid-June….Over his final 98 games, Ramírez hit .264 with a .763 OPS, 13 home runs and 64 RBI. He struck out 63 times and walked just 35 while essentially batting one-handed from the left side. - Joe Noga
When that road trip started on June 14 Jose was hitting .292/1.030 with 13 home runs in 167 at-bats. From June 15 on he hit 16 home runs in 434 at-bats, so the injury definitely affected his ability to drive the ball. Assuming he can avoid a similar injury next year his production should be significantly higher.
Oscar Gonzalez hit .296/.789 in 91 games. Assuming he’ll play more like 150 next year this should also boost the offense.
Will Brennan hit .357/.900 in a small sample of 42 AB’s, but he has a chance to also increase the offensive output. Last year Benson, Jones, and Palacios combined for about 250 mostly unproductive at-bats (.235 combined BA). Gonzalez and Brennan should get those at-bats this year.
So…between a more productive Jose Ramirez, a more productive Myles Straw, Kwan hitting leadoff all season, a full year of Oscar Gonzalez, and a lot more production from the DH position, the Guardians should score far more runs than last year, and that’s not including any additional production from the catching position, which had a line of .180/.530 last year. They’ll probably sign somebody who can do better than that.
What would more runs mean to the win-loss record?
The Guardians were 61-5 this year when scoring five runs or more. Obviously they lost some games by scores like 8-2 where even if they scored five runs they would have still lost. But I found 32 losses where the opponent scored four runs or fewer, meaning five runs would have won the game for the Guardians. There were also several games where the opponents scored exactly five runs and the G’s lost. So more offense would definitely result in quite a few more wins, and there are several reasons to believe the offense will be much better.
If even eight of those 32 losses where the opponent failed to score five runs could be turned into wins the Guardians would be a 100-win team.
As for the pitching, the top three starters were nails, although it took a few weeks to ramp them up after the lockout and shortened spring training.
Aaron Civale got off to a horrible start, allowing 27 runs in 31 innings in April and May. The lockout seemed to affect him more than anyone since he depends on impeccable command of multiple pitches. The rest of the season he had a 3.55 ERA despite three separate stints on the IL, each lasting 3-4 weeks. With a full spring training this season I expect Aaron to pick up where he left off. Whether he can stay healthy is the question.
The bullpen is what I’m really excited about. James Karinchak was injured to start last season and his first game was July 4. Pitching only half the season he had a 2.08 ERA and took over Bryan Shaw’s spot as the set-up man. Shaw had an ERA of 5.40. This year we’ll have Karinchak right from the start.
Trevor Stephan started the season as a middle reliever but was moved up and by the second half was regularly pitching in high leverage situations. He finished with a 2.69 ERA.
Nick Sandlin had a 3.66 ERA as of July 5. From then on he pitched 25 innings, allowing 12 hits, 3 earned runs, and a 1.08 ERA. He really came on strong after being sent down to work on his command.
Eli Morgan had a mid-season hiccup but in his last 18.2 innings allowed 10 hits, 2 earned runs, and a 0.96 ERA.
Cody Morris got his first appearance on Sep. 2, allowing 2 runs in 2 innings. From there on out he pitched 23.3 innings with a 1.52 ERA. I think he’s got a great chance to take over Plesac’s spot in the rotation.
The bullpen should be better with Shaw gone and Karinchak available from the start. Also, Sandlin and Morgan finished very strong and should pick up where they left off. We still have Clase, Stephan, and Hentges, who were fantastic. In Hentges’ last 15.1 innings (Sep and Oct) he allowed 4 hits, 0 runs, and struck out 20. He looked like Andrew Miller the last five weeks. The growth in Hentges, Sandlin, Morgan, and Stephan was extremely impressive.
After starting 19-24 (May 29) the Guardians finished 73-46, which projects to a 99-win season. - Joe Noga
There’s no reason they should start 19-24 this year since Straw and Reyes won’t be hitting leadoff and cleanup, the starters won’t be dealing with a short spring training, Bell and Gonzalez will be in the lineup, and Karinchak won’t be injured and Shaw won’t be pitching the 8th innings. Cody Morris may be starting or at least will take Shaw’s spot in the pen. Bieber will be in a contract year and not coming off an arm injury. Straw won’t hit .221.
Finally, the shortened basepaths will allow the Guardians to use their excellent team speed to steal even more bases. The Guardians were third in baseball with 119 steals last year. They should blow that out of the water.
I see no reason the Guardians won’t win 100 games other than injuries to multiple starters and/or Jose Ramirez.
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