Yankees vs. Guardians: AL Championship Series Preview

It worked out that the top two seeds in the American League have advanced to the championship series, and the Yankees will have homefield advantage over the Guardians starting Monday night, though I’m not so sure that’s a great thing. Also, this did not work out well for me scheduling wise because I’ll be covering the Bills game Monday night about 15 miles from Yankee Stadium, and I won’t be able to watch baseball. So close, and yet so far away! And because I’ll be traveling back home Tuesday morning, there won’t be a Game 1 newsletter. Sorry folks, but my regular job got in the way. Here’s a few thoughts on the ALCS as it gets started.

Obviously, it could backfire in a big way because this is baseball and nothing is ever a given, but I was hoping the Yankees were going to get Cleveland instead of Detroit, and it happened.

The Tigers just felt like a team of destiny, similar to how the Mets were feeling in the National League, at least until they got smoked Sunday night by the Dodgers in Game 1 of the NLCS.

I just think the Guardians are a better matchup for the Yankees, but as I said, baseball is the most fickle of all sports, nothing is ever as it seems, and while the Yankees could steamroll their way to their first pennant since 2009, they could just as easily fall flat on their face against the pesky AL Central champs.

During the regular season, the Yankees won four of the six games, winning two-of-three in both series. The Yankees had a 7-5 lead in the 10th inning of the finale in Cleveland on April 14, but the dearly departed Caleb Ferguson imploded and gave up three runs to lose the game 8-7. Then in late August in New York, the Guardians won the opener 9-5 when they scored six runs in the 12th inning off Tim Mayza and Michael Tonkin before the Yankees rallied to win the last two games with Gerrit Cole dominating in the finale with six innings of shutout, one-hit ball.

The Guardians are a pretty mundane offensive team. During the regular season they hit 185 home runs which was good for 12th, but their team OPS was 17th at .702, their batting average ranked 22nd at .238, and their 4.40 runs per game was 14th, just a tick above the 4.39 MLB average.

That said, there are obviously some dangerous players led by the great Jose Ramirez who might be the quietest superstar in the sport. The third baseman had another great season as he fell just one home run shy of becoming the seventh player in MLB history to have a 40-40 season. He tied his career high with 39 homers and set a career-high with 41 stolen bases while also driving in 118 runs, and he slashed .279/.335/.537 with an OPS of .872. However, the Yankees did a great job against him as he went just 3-for-23 with one homer in six games.

“He’s the complete package,” Aaron Boone told reporters Sunday. “I get on people all the time. If I hear another, ‘How underappreciated, underrated’ he is from somebody on a network or something, I want to rip my arms off and throw it at the TV. He’s not underappreciated. He is not underrated. He’s a great on track Hall of Fame player, and everybody knows it, including everyone sitting out here.”

First baseman Josh Naylor, who is a pretty easy guy to despise, had 31 homers and 108 RBI but he batted just .243 with a ho-hum .776 OPS and against the Yankees he was just 4-for-21 with a homer.

And then there’s leadoff left-fielder Steven Kwan who is coming off an ALDS where he stroked 11 hits, one shy of the ALDS record. He is the ultimate pest, meaning he’s exactly the kind of guy I wish played for the Yankees. Making contract is like an art form for this guy and he slashed .292/.368/.425 for an OPS of .793. The Yankees have to find a way to keep him off the bases.

They have a young kid in right field named Jhonkensy Noel who provided pop - 13 homers in 198 plate appearances after being called up from Triple-A - and they made a great trade deadline acquisition in getting center fielder Lane Thomas from the Nationals, a player I hoped the Yankees would have traded for last year at the deadline. He hit the grand slam off Detroit ace Tarik Skubal Saturday in Game 5 that essentially sent the Guardians to New York.

Otherwise, there’s not much else on offense. Their double play combination of shortstop Bryan Rocchio and second baseman Andres Gimenez is as good as any in MLB in the field, but neither guy provided much offense, though Gimenez did hit .252 and stole 30 bases.

At catcher, both Bo Naylor and Austin Hedges are solid defensively, but neither hits a lick, while DH David Fry hit 14 homers and had an OPS of .804.

On the mound, the Guardians are really depleted in the rotation. In the ALDS they started their best man, Tanner Bibee, twice and Matthew Boyd twice, while Alex Cobb got the other start. Those three guys pitched just 18.1 innings combined because first-year manager Stephen Vogt knew he could not trust them for a third time through the Tigers’ batting order.

Cobb is getting the Game 1 start against Carlos Rodon. He pitched Game 3 in Detroit and gave up two runs on three hits and a walk in three innings, this after he pitched in only three games during the regular season because of a spate of injuries.

Bibee made 31 starts and went 12-8 with a 3.47 ERA and a 1.117 WHIP so he’ll likely be tough on the Yankees. Boyd made only eight regular appearances, all starts, and had a 2.72 ERA and 1.134 WHIP. Oh, he’s also a lefty, and for whatever reasons, lefties bedeviled the Yankees this year.

The strength of the Guardians is their bullpen which was far and away the best in MLB as it was No. 1 with a 2.57 ERA, way ahead of runner-up Milwaukee (3.11). Comparatively, the Yankees’ bullpen ERA was more than a run higher at 3.62. Cleveland’s relievers had a 1.050 WHIP and opponents hit just .203. Without question, the Yankees cannot afford to get into the late innings trailing because it’s going to be very difficult to come back against this team.

The hammer at the end is Emmanuel Clase, the best closer in the game. He was mortal in the ALDS as he gave up the losing three-run homer to Kerry Carpenter in Game 2 and yielded another run in Game 5. How crazy was it that he allowed four earned runs in the series? He allowed just five in 74 appearances in the regular season as he had a 0.61 ERA, a 0.659 WHIP, saved 47 games and had a strikeout-to-walk ratio of 6.60. I mean, that’s unbelievable in every way.

He’s the best there is, but the Guardians also have tremendous bridge guys in Cade Smith (1.91 ERA), Hunter Gaddis (1.57), Tim Herrin (1.92), Eli Morgan (1.93), Andrew Walters (0.00 in just eight innings) and Erik Sabrowski (0.00 in 12.2 innings). And all six of those guys had a WHIP under 1.000.

As I said, this is going to be problematic for a Yankees team that managed only 14 runs and hit .220 against the Royals, a team that can’t come close to pitching as well as the Guardians.

Here’s what we know about the schedule for the series, and the expected early pitching matchups:

• Game 1: Monday, 7:38 on TBS - Carlos Rodon vs. Alex Cobb.

• Game 2: Tuesday, 7:38 on TBS - Gerrit Cole vs. Tanner Bibee.

• Game 3: Thursday, 5:08 on TBS - Clarke Schmidt vs. TBD

• Game 4: Friday, 8:08 on TBS - Luis Gill vs. TBD

• Game 5: Saturday, 8:08 on TBS (if necessary)

• Game 6: Monday, 5:08 on TBS (if necessary)

• Game 7: Tuesday, 7:38 on TBS (if necessary).