Roster For The Tampa Bay Series

 OK, celebration over. Time to get to work and the first order of business is to name the roster for the Tampa Bay series.  So here are my thoughts:

ROSTER BALANCE

As much as I loved the flexibility or 14 position players, the CWS series really taxed the bullpen.  I think we have to go 13/13 this time.

ROSTER BREAKDOWN

Position Players (13)

Catchers (2): Bailey and Hedges

Infielders (5): Lowe, Bazzana, Rocchio, Ramirez, Genao

Outfieleres (5): Kwan, Halpin, DeLauter, Adell, Halpin

Utility (1): Schneeman

Pitchers (13)

Starters: Messick, Williams

Openers: Espino, Cecconi

Bulk Relievers: Bibee, Cantillo, Griffin, 

Relievers: Smith, Sabrowski, Gaddis, Herrin, Festa, Armstrong

SUMMARY

So, for me, this boils down to one choice: removing Schneeman or Fry from the ALDS roster.  Tampa Bay has a reasonable balance of 4 lefties and 9 righties so I would not base the decision on handedness. I would make this decision based on my continuing Michael Martinez comp: Martinez was a last player on the roster type, a versatile defended but with a very, very weak bat.  He was the last batter in the 2016 World Series for Cleveland and could only manage to hit the ball weakly for 80 feet as an easy out, mimicking his offensive ineptness for the season and his career.  Although Schneeman has had a bad offensive season I still think that I would choose Schneeman 100 times out of 100 to bat in that situation instead of Martinez.  Fry has one advantage over Schneeman as he is a catcher but he can travel with the team and be rostered if something happened to Bailey or Hedges...or they could roster Ingle.  Aside from that, Schneeman is the better choice and Fry would lose his roster spot.

People will question me leaving Festa on the roster but, to me, Festa is your sacrificial lamb.  We did not have a negative blowout in the CWS series and so Festa didn't pitch. I disagree with people who said if Vogt didn't trust Festa in the White Sox series why was he on the roster.  They just did not need the skill set he brought: length in a blowout loss.  Also, as a last resort extra inning pitcher in deep extra innings, you could do a lot worse than Festa, especially with no ghost runner in playoff extra innings. If we have one of those two situations in the TB series, you watch as Vogt deploys Festa as needed.

So, that's it.  Without going for it by bringing up Ralphy as a secret weapon, this is, IMO, the best roster we can have with what we have to work with.

And please, no Rhys Hoskins.  

Thoughts For A Saturday Night

Congratulations to the Guardians on their historic win in the ALDS and, particularly, in the last game of that series.

Congratulations to the White Sox on their excellent season with EIGHT rookies on the post-season roster.  The future is bright and I hope we see you guys and us in the playoffs for years to come.  

There is only one negative thing that I will say here and probably this will be an unpopular hot take:

The Guardians management team went all-out to win this series.  The usage of Cade Smith, Gavin Williams, Hunter Gaddis and others and the non- or slight-use of Schneeman, Festa, Espino, Fry and others is troubling to me.  These guys are major league players, all of whom have had big moments in their careers and some even in the post-season.  It takes a village to win in the regular season and while I note that the bench has shorten a bit in the post-season, it should always be remembered that burning- or freezing out players in the post-season is not good for the future of this team.  I love Schneeman's game and if you can replace Festa with a high-leverage arm this off-season and if you want to replace Fry bc you think he is more AAAA than ML, I get it.  But, at some point, you HAVE to realize that besides the obvious that these are human beings, major league players don't grow on trees.  So, I'll tell you this: you are Cleveland, you just can't go out and replace these young players because they struggle because you end up with Fairchild, Brogdon, etc. 

Keep the young guys, the inexperienced guys and give them reps.  If you want to 'go for it' do that by bringing up a Ralphy Velasquez.  Stop worrying about his service time and ability to play at AAA in what will be a very diluted league if there is a lockout next year.  

So, Guardians one-and-all, congratulations.  Good luck against Tampa Bay.  I think you have what is necessary to make a WS run.  Eight more wins, all of them tough, and you are WS champions.  But let's do it in such a way that builds for the future from within. I love this team and the players in the organization and I want to see them play together for years to come, at least through 2031.  

Thoughts For A Monday - Playoff Edition

 They Did It!

Congratulations to the 2026 AL Central Division champion Cleveland Guardians.  You know the numbers:

Three in a row

Four of the last 5

Seven of the last 11

We are truly spoiled.  Living in San Diego and hearing the hype of the Padres being excited because it is the first time in their history they have gone to the playoffs 3 years in a row puts it all in perspective for me, no pun intended.

So, let's enjoy it and NEVER take this feeling for granted.  

The boys have brought it home to us again.  Thanks, guys, for the hard work. Ditto for all the support staff.  

I love baseball above all sports and as I get older, I realize I have less and less of these moments left.  So thanks guys for the 2026 memories.  Let's make some more this October. As Hammy says, let's have an October to remember!

Go Guardians!

ALDS Playoff Roster

While we are waiting for the wild card series to complete, the inevitable talk about the playoff roster is heating up.  Teams can change their playoff rosters for each round and can even replace players who get injured.  Any player in the organization as of August 31st is eligible although if they are not on the 40-man roster they will have to be added. 

So, with that in mind, here are my thoughts about the playoff rosters for the ALDS series.

Pitchers (12)

Starters/Bulk Relievers

Messick

Williams

Cantillo

Long Relievers

Cecconi

Bibee

Festa

Short Relievers

Espino

Gaddis

Herrin

Sabrowski

Smith

Armstrong

POSITION PLAYERS (14)

Hedges

Bailey

Fry

Lowe

Bazzana

Schneeman

Genao

Rocchio

Ramirez

Kwan

DeLauter

Martinez

Adell

Velazquez

Thoughts: I am on board with 12 pitchers in the ALDS.  I would like to see 14 hitters and the natural thing would be to just use the 14 we have now.  However, Genao gives us backups at 3 infield positions. Fry gives us a little positional flexibility, too. It would be nice to have one wildcard, especially if we play the White Sox and that is where I roll the dice with Ralphy.  If you don't want Ralphy then I would say bring up Ingle.  Halpin, to me, brings very little to the table offensively, he is not a great CF defender and his one redeeming characteristic is that he leads the team in sacrufucesm a 'weapon' I would like to take out of Vogt's hands.  BTW, Ingle doesn't touch the field offensively and would DH and PH only.  I am pretty sure it will be Halpin but I would love to see Ralphy or Ingle.

AFL - Nothing To See Here

The Guardians, based on who they usually assign, scoff at the Arizona Fall League as an important tool in player development.  The 2026 contingent of Cleveland prospects is probably the most stark example of that in our team's history of sending players to the AFL.

Let's take a look at the players they are sending:

Position Players

Luke Hill

Welbyn Francisca

Tyrese Turner 

Pitchers

Aaron Davenport

Kyle Scott

Aiden Major

Magnus Ellerts

Cam Schuelke

My Thoughts:

Using MLB Pipeline's ratings, Luke Hill is the top prospect (#15) we are sending to the AFL and I think he is overrated as he appears as the #32 prospect on my most recent ranking.  Welbyn Francisca (#19) is the next highest ranked prospect.  Along with Tyrese Turner, who is the epitome of an organizational soldier, our position player participants all missed various amounts of time this year and are just getting extra reps.  None of these 3 are what I would call top prospects

The pitchers we are sending are even less interesting, for a vareity of reasons.  Aaron Davenport and Kyle Scott are recovering from Tommy John surgery and certainly Davenport, easily the best prospect among the pitchers, is too early in his recovery to actually pitch. Aiden Major and Magnus Ellerts missed significant time this year and are not top prospects, either.  Cam Schuelke is a gimmick pitcher, throwing from three distinctly different arm slots which can baffle the heck out of young hitters.  As with most gimmick pitchers he uses deception due to a lack of ANY discernible velocity.  None of the 5 of these pitchers are considered top prospects even though I was convinced Davenport was due for the breakout year I have been anticipating since I saw FIVE instructors working with him in spring training a couple of years ago.  You don't have 5 instructors working with on one pitcher in spring training if the team doesn't think there is something really special there. 

So, while there are some guys who are, in my opinion, intriguing but fringy prospects, this seems, once again, like Cleveland is just fulfilling their obligation to send players to the AFL to help keep the league viable.

I hope these guys prove me wrong but I am not real excited about the AFL this year, at least in terms of the Guardians' participants.  I do, however, wish good luck to all these guys in this next, positive, step towards reaching their dreams of becoming ML players.

PLAYOFF TELEVISION SCHEDULE

Lots of chatter about day games during the week in the playoffs.  My opinion is that the only driver for this is money.  Attempts to draw analogies to NCAA basketball are just comical.  The only reason this goes on in MLB is to make money from 'casual' fans watching games that are not their own team.  Those fans would still ahve an option of watching games, just on tape delay.  No, the only reasons for spreading the games out all day is more lucrative TV contracts and increased advertiser revenue.  Once again, for the owners it is all about making more money to stuff in their pockets.

Thoughts For A Friday Morning

 Three regular season games left.  There is a reading between the lines here as there will be more baseball, playoff baseball, October baseball, for the Guardians.

Before we get to this last series I just wanted to say thank you to the Guardians players for making this season another special one.  And thanks to the FO for the deadline deals.  Might some of them blow up in our faces in years to come?  Maybe.  But for right now they all ahve seemed to help, at least somewhat, if not always consently.

I wanted to take a look at some of our players and say thanks individually:

Cade Smith - OMG, you have been such a rock.  Your determinated yet cool composure is great

Jose Ramirez - I know this hasn't been your best season but you are still the GOAT.  However, for the rest of the season just be the guy who keeps the line moving on offense and demands excellent play and leads by example with his teammates.

Daniel Schneeman - I know your playing time has evaporated but not my confidence in you.  As I have said many times, 2 outs down a run in the 9th inning of a playoff game and you are the last guy on the bench.  I feel confident in you coming in ang getting the job done.  You have been the comsummate professional through all your offensive struggles and your defense is top notch.  If I was the GM, you would have that 26th spot on our roster until you retire.

David Fry - Keep your head up.  I still think the 2024 version is in there somewhere.  Maybe not the all-star version of you but an important bench piece if you just find your niche as the 25th guy on the roster.

Travis Bazzana - Watching you your entire pro career I have one thing to say to you.  Swing hard every time.  Weak contact is no contact.  I don't care if you luck into hits with weak contact.  You need to impact the ball.  So, swing hard, every time in every game in every situation.  No hesitation in your body or your mind.  Swing hard.

Brayan Rocchio - You are a ML SS.  You will be an all-star in the future.  But, right now, be playoff Rocchio the rest of this year.  Play with the confidence on offense and defense that we all have in you as a player.

Rest of the team - Fill the roles this team has for you. You have all had your moments this year and just keep doing what you do.  Players like you who have had your moments in the regular season are so much more likely to have those in the post-season.  Be ready.  Have those moments.  Continue to help us win.

Three more games in KC and we need to win them all.  The playoffs start now.  Go Guards!

It's Time To Re-Align - Let's Goooooo

 Expansion has been proposed as part of the new CBA.  My preference is to put a team in Salt Lake City and one in Nashville to bring us up to 32 total.

That being said, here is my realignment plan:

AL Northeast

NYY

Toronto

Pittsburgh

Baltimore

NL Northeast

Boston

NY Mets

Washington

Philadelphia

AL Southeast

Tampa Bay

Nashville

Houston

Texas

NL Southeast

Atlanta

Miami

St. Louis

Cincinnati

AL North

Cleveland

Detroit

Milwaukee

Chicago WS

NL North

Chicago Cubs

Minnesota

Salt Lake City

Kansas City

NL West

LA Dodgers

San Francisco

LA Angels

Las Vegas

AL West

San Diego

Colorado

Arizona

Seattle

So there is my attempt at putting the 32 teams in baseball in divisions.

At 3 games per team against the teams in the other league (45 games) and 7 games per team in your own league outside of your division (84), that leaves 11 games per team inside your division (33) to give a 162 game schedule. 

Playoffs would be the division champions (8) and the top 2 records in each league (4) to give the same number of teams (12 in the playoffs). Same playoff format as currently exists EXCEPT I would eliminate 5 games series in the ALDS and replace with 7 game series.  

Thoughts for a Friday - Nine Games To Go

 Lots to talk about relative to our first place Cleveland Guardians.  

Reminds me of a funny story that I hope doesn't repeat itself with our baseball team.  A number of years ago, before they were national champions, the Indiana Hoosiers came to Ohio State to play the Buckeyes in football and, as fate had it, Indiana scored first, taking a 7-0 lead.  As the legend goes, during the TV timeout after the extra point, the Indiana coach had his entire team pose in front of the scoreboard that showed them being ahead of the Buckeyes.  I think the final score was like 63-7.  Let's hope we haven't poked the bear by beating the White Sox the last two days.

Thursday night brought us Texas losing at the end to Boston (good for us because it moved us further ahead of Texas and cemented Boston as the #2 wild card which might help us when we go to Boston next week).  It saw Murikami hit a 3-run homer in the first for Chicago's only runs against Detroit and Houston predictably beat up KC at home.    

The stage is set.

The Guardians are tied in the standings with the White Sox for the AL Central Title

They are two games ahead of Toronto for the Wild Card

They are two games ahead of Texas for the Wild Card

They are one game ahead of Houston for the 2nd seed in the AL

Obviously, the Guardians do not own the tiebreaker over Toronto or CWS but do own the tiebreaker over Texas and Houston.

You will read countless articles between now and the end of the season about playoff scenarios but scoreboard watching on Thursday night reminds me that there is only one certainty: if you keep winning good things will likely happen.  Happened in 2024. Happened in 2025.  Yes, Toronto and Chicago have easy schedules. Texas and Houston have similar schedules to Cleveland.  But you just have to keep winning.

So, let's go Guardians!  L

Let's hope the crowd is effective at giving us a big home field advantage this weekend and we use it.

Let's hope the boys play their best, most solid baseball of the year, batters work deeep in counts and pitchers get ahead early in counts and our hitters do what is necessary to score runs in picket fences with the occasional crocked numbers.

These are our boys of summer and, though we're moving into fall, more than anything else, I hope they keep making great memories for themselves and for us fans. Go Guardians!

Thoughts For A Tuesday Morning - Hangover from the Biggest Game of the Season That Wasn't

Have Hope - Last Night Just Made It A Little Harder

 First, no season hangs on one AB or one pitch.  Yeah, Peters had a historically crazy long AB, Lowe screwed up, Rocchio didn't make a spectacular play to get Benitendi to open the inning and Herrin threw gasoline on the fire.

But we are only 1.5 games out of the lead in the AL Central and, thanks to the Tigers' fight and grit last night, we still hold a one game lead over Blue Jays.

Of the three teams (CLE, CWS, TOR) the Guardians have the most difficult remaining schedule.  And even Texas is still lurking as the slight dark horse in all this.

All we have to do is take care of business.

1. We need to win the next two games against Chicago to stay close.

2. We need to win the rest of our series to not require A LOT of help from the teams Chicago and Toronto play.

3. We need to pitch, hit, run the bases and play defense at a very high level. But this this under-resourced team, when has that NOT been true this season.

But there is hope.  Win the next game. Then the next. Win the next series and don't get wrapped around the axel if we don't sweep series.

It is still there for our taking.  We can win the division...or we won't.  We can be the 3rd wildcard...or we won't.

I just ask fans to keep the over-reaching negativity to a minimum.  Yeah, be ticked about the one inning last night. Be ticked about the one inning on Saturday.  But, in the past two weeks, that's all it's been...two really bad innings. 

It all comes down to the players now.  Let's just get it done, guys.

Random Thoughts About Last Night's Game

1. I know it's just my thing, but I really want Kwan to get his 5th gold glove and he will only do that in LF.

2. Bazzana, on defense, is really bad.  The throw from Kwan should have resulted in an out. He is the caution cone people say he is.  His work taking throws from the catcher and the OF is just freaking abysmal.  He will need to work in the OF in the off-season.

3. I hope Martinez is not hurt but I am pretty sure he is going to the IL for the rest of the season. He should have come out when he felt something even though it was in the middle of his AB.  His machismo cost us that AB because he had no ability to hit the ball on his last two swings.  This is a team game, Angel, and you need to learn when to gut it out and when not to.  If, in fact, he is done for the rest of the season, he should have been pulled in the middle of that AB.

4. In the face of frustration last night, one ironically comical, nervous laugh-generating moment did occure.  Fry, who came in for Lowe, mad a weak out against a LHP but hit a HR against a RHP, supporting his splits this year.  How does that make you feel, analytics nerds, who have no doubt promoted the platoon idea re. Fry this year.  

5. We simply need to take advantage of our chances on offense.  There is no other way to say it.  We have to be able to make up for pitching or defensive gaffes.

6. Two throws last night made me scratch my head:

a.    Bailey's setup on the bases-loaded grounder to Ramirez was very bad.  He should have been on the fair side of home plate with his left foot ont the plate so Ramirez had a lane to throw. Instead, Ramirez had to make an unbelievably risky throw that almost hit the runner.  I mean, from the Ramirez-eye replay, you couldn't even see Bailey with the runner coming down the line. No excuse for that.

b. Lowe's error could have been avoided if Rocchio had been on the infield side of second base. Instead, he didn't give Lowe an angle to throw, leading to the error. Yeah, the runner being where he was did contribute but, actually, Rocchio didn't have to be on the bag when he took the throw to defintely get one out and still maybe get a DP.

Both these defensive plays were inexcusable when you knew you had to play solid defense because you offense wasn't producing.

Summary

Let's go Guards. Your back is againstt the wall.  This is when champions come through.  Let's be champions!  Just win every series from now on and let the chips fall where they may.