Series Recap Ariah Cookingham Series Recap Ariah Cookingham

Fisher loses Ownership Rights Of A’s to The Cleveland Guardians.

Welp, as you probably predicted, the Guardians are 16-6 and the winningest team in the Majors. Stephen Vogt has made an absolute mess of his previous employer this year, winning the season series 6 to 1. Josh Naylor is just as psychotic as expected, hitting the shit out of baseballs and his own noggin. Steven Kwan records four hits in one game. The Kinderguardians are firing on all cylinders and have been for 4 weeks. Is this ACTUALLY sustainable?

Welp, as you probably predicted, the Guardians are 16-6 and the winningest team in the Majors. Stephen Vogt has made an absolute mess of his previous employer this year, winning the season series 6 to 1. Josh Naylor is just as psychotic as expected, hitting the shit out of baseballs and his own noggin. Steven Kwan records four hits in one game. The Kinderguardians are firing on all cylinders and have been for 4 weeks. Is this ACTUALLY sustainable?

MOTY Vogt-ing

We obviously didn’t know what to expect on the managing front. I think we were all excited but curious what could happen when replacing a hall of fame manager with a rookie manager that retired just two years ago. The lineup construction, match-up mentality, and fire in the dugout has proven to me that the front office made the best choice. Vogt does everything that Tito wouldn’t do. I have ZERO bad to say about Tito, but the guy was loyal to a fault. Miles Straw was gone immediately, Vogt developed a lineup for lefties and righties and has been implementing them flawlessly. The “one day at a time” mentality when crafting the lineup card has proven to be extremely effective so far and with Manzardo starting to get hot in the minors, I can only imagine the excitement of adding that name to the card relatively soon.

Josh Naylor is an Absolute Unit

Every day that goes by, the people of Cleveland wake up and look themselves in the eye in the bathroom mirror. We stare at ourselves with utter disgust and ask “Why did we not lock him down this offseason?” It’s a simple answer really. Because it costs money. But holy shit is this guy taking the league by storm. Over three games against Oakland, Josh Naylor tallied 7 RBIs and 2 bing bongs. The guy steps to the plate with so much attitude it buzzes through my body like the static on a shitty tv. Every cut he takes causes his helmet to seemingly jump out of the way and on to the ground, scared to get any piece of the force he is putting into the ball. His blood runs ice-cold and no moment is too big. He has officially played way too well to spend more than his guaranteed time in Cleveland. Does that mean I won’t be begging every god I can think of for an extension? Absolutely not.

King Kwan Reigns Supreme

If I was granted three wishes by a genie, I am embarrassed to tell you that two of those wishes would involve extending Guardians players. Kwan is the other one of them. Over the 3 games in Oakland, Kwan hit 3 doubles and had a four hit game in the 6-3 win on Saturday. The electricity that runs through the top of this lineup is beautiful and considering we are 28th in the league in runs contribute by the long ball, we have finally figured out how to score runs consistently with base hits. Kwan has purchased property on 2nd base and more often then not, he comes home before trotting to the dugout. Kwan is second in the league in hits and average, just one hit behind Ohtani. His new found aggressiveness has paid off immensely and of course his defense in left field has remained gold glove caliber.

The Guardians come away with a series sweep at home and you can’t help but start to think… is this the Vogt era? Is this just the new Guardians? I know, its not even May. But this is one of the best starts this team has had since 1948. Remember what happened in 1948? Me neither because my grandparents weren’t born yet. But rumor has it.. the boys won a World Series. Stay tuned for my blog post in October titled “Hang the Banner.”

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Series Recap Ariah Cookingham Series Recap Ariah Cookingham

Blame It On The Rain

My main takeaways from this series are that the Yankees are pretty good right now, our pitching in general looks like a beer truck with no brakes, but we are just scrappy enough to squeak out the dubs we need and stay, oh yeah, at the top of the majors as far as win percentage goes. The future is uncertain, to say the least, but if theres one thing we can depend on, we are NEVER out of a ball game.

We finally lost our first series. Luckily, it was to one of the hottest teams in baseball, but also the spawn of satan in the baseball world, the New York Yankees. I’m gonna take a page out of the book of the 2016 World Series and blame the rain. I mean we had to play the yankees lineup twice on Saturday. Juan Soto and Aaron Judge were batting back to back. That’s just fucked.

But no, seriously, I wasn’t upset about the series lost. Anytime the Yankees win, it sucks, but they are playing phenomenal baseball right now and I just didn’t truly see us winning that series. Starting pitching is becoming a massive concern for Cleveland. It’s a time bomb, ticking away, and I think we can expect an implosion sooner rather than later. As a collective unit, the only thing our starting pitching is not missing is bats. We are giving up wayyy too many walks and there is not much swing and miss to be spoken of.

The sad part about a struggling rotation is that 99% of the time, that leads to a bruised and beaten bullpen. When it comes to bullpen usage, we are one of the most active bullpens in the league and we all knew that was going to be an issue. Logan Allen is the last starter to throw 6 innings and that was in Seattle. I am sad to say, I don’t know who can throw 6 right now. Maybe Tanner if he can capture the magic in a bottle he found last year but he is one of the most disappointing guys in the rotation right now.

That all being said, the bats are still pretty hot. Kwan is still a menace at the plate, Josh is batting .368, and Estevan Florial came into this series with REVENGE on his mind. If it wasn’t for the slap-hitting shit goblins that his team is, we would have a very different start to the year.

My main takeaways from this series are that the Yankees are pretty good right now, our pitching in general looks like a beer truck with no brakes, but we are just scrappy enough to squeak out the dubs we need and stay, oh yeah, at the top of the majors as far as win percentage goes. The future is uncertain, to say the least, but if theres one thing we can depend on, we are NEVER out of a ball game.

Heading on the road to Boston, I am crossing my fingers for some decent turn-out from some key guys on the mound. We need Xzavion Curry and Ben Lively to put in work, we need the bullpen guys to throw two innings occasionally, and we HAVE to give them some run support because they are going to give up some runs. I would be surprised if Boston was held to a couple runs in any of the four-game set.

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TRIDENTS DOWN

The MLB Twitter admin released a power rankings for the starting rotations at the beginning of the year. Seattle sat atop at number one and in reading the article, the decision was not very difficult for them to come to. As always, it was Ohio Against the World coming to the PNW. The Guardians did what they do best, chopped the head off the snake, came out on top, and made the MLB Admin eat their words, resulting in the Guards appearing on MLB’s Twitter Timeline every day for a week, quite possibly for the first time ever.

The MLB Twitter admin released a power rankings for the starting rotations at the beginning of the year. Seattle sat atop at number one and in reading the article, the decision was not very difficult for them to come to. As always, it was Ohio Against the World coming to the PNW. The Guardians did what they do best, chopped the head off the snake, came out on top, and made the MLB Admin eat their words, resulting in the Guards appearing on MLB’s Twitter Timeline every day for a week, quite possibly for the first time ever.

Game 1: Triston Mckenzie vs. Emerson Hancock

This game frustrated me a bit, I won’t lie. I felt like if the Guardians were going to win a certain game this series, it was this one, being that Emerson Hancock is the only pitcher we were facing who would likely not be in the running for CY votes. I was wrong. Very wrong.

The guards went down 5-2 in an unexpectedly tough outing by Sticks. They battled back and ended up losing a 5-4 game, which made it sting a little less because we got to see the kids scrap back and give themselves a shot. But this game kept me up at night for one main reason; is Triston ok?

Triston’s velocity on his fastball dipped down to 89mph. His slider was 88 mph. This simply is not going to work. I think it was this separation that made him easy to hit. It also seemed like every time he missed, it was high and over the plate. Both of these things are telltale signs of an injury, especially on a pitcher who was supposed to be 100% to start the season. I noticed these glaring details in his last spring start, but everyone on Twitter told me to stop worrying. So I did. Now, he had a very similar outing in his first regular-season start, and you can now color me concerned.

Game 2: Shane Bieber vs. Luis Castillo

Lemme just start by saying, Shane Bieber is back man. Every time I see him pitch in person, it gives me goosebumps. He went 6 innings, with 9 strikeouts, and no walks. Over his first two starts, he has not allowed a run and has recorded 20 punch-outs. It’s just gross, man.

You could say I have come to expect a great outing from Bieber. I cannot say I expected us to knock around Luis Castillo. The Guardians hit Luis Castillo 10 times and Bo Naylor took him deep to right center. Eli Morgan, who still kind of sucks, came in and blew the shutout. But Barlow, Beede, and Clase finished the job with two baserunners, a walk from Beede, and a hit on Clase.

Game 3: Logan Allen vs. George Kirby

Again, I don’t think a lot of people would look at this matchup on paper and guess the outcome. George Kirby has been a very sneaky top pitcher in the majors the last two years with a career WHIP of 1.1 and 3.3 ERA. Kirby has historically shut down the Guards, allowing just two runs in 9 innings. Logan was coming off a pretty “Eh” start to his 2024 campaign against a very bad Oakland team, giving up two HRs in 5 innings. The stars just didn’t seem to align for us here.

UNTIL THEY DID. With the help of a Kwan Single, a Jose Double, and a Will Brennan Single, the Guardians were up 3-0 before Logan Allen even took the bump. Rocchio, Kwan, and Gime kept on hitting and the Guards kept on scoring, up 5-0 before the bottom of the 2nd. Fast Forward to the 4th and Kwan, Gimenez, Jose, and Brennan all record another hit to bring the grand total to 8 runs. Yes, the Guardians had 10 hits and 8 runs on George Kirby.

After George Kirby took a seat in the dugout, my girlfriend and I looked up and couldn’t believe it. About 100 birds were circling the dead carcass of the Mariner’s starting rotation.

Ultimately, Logan Allen would throw a 6.2-inning GEM. Giving up just 4 hits and sitting down 6 on strikes, he would hand the Mariners their second shutout loss so far this year. The best pitcher of the game for Seattle would end up being Josh Rojas… yes, the Mariner’s part-time third baseman, who closed the game out and did not give up a knock. Every time he threw the ball, the T-Mobile Radar Gun would read “Curveball” which is funny because it didn’t curve much. It had just never displayed “65mph Fastball” before.

So basically, the Guardians came to Seattle, starting their season on the road, and faced two pitchers competing for the Ace spot on one of the best starting rotations in baseball. The Guardians proceeded to knock the living shit out of them for 20 hits and 12 runs. Our boys lead the league in run differential (+28) and have started the Vogt Era at a cool 5-2. Heading to Minnesota to play our first divisional series, here’s to the bats staying hot and the beer cold. Go Guards.

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We are SOOOOOOO Back!

I can’t tell if it’s the return of Hedgie and Cookie, if it’s the youth in our new manager, or just excitement for the new season, but the VIBES ARE IMMACULATE.

Over the 4 game set, 3 of which were in a rain storm, the entire dugout was on the top step yelling and cheering the whole game. There is a new “star of the game” tradition going on in the clubhouse where the stand-out Guardian of the day dons a gaudy WWE Guardians belt. Freeman went ballistic when he reached second on the first RBI hit of the year. I don’t know man, call me crazy, but this feels like a scrappy squad. We lost the fire last year, but it feels to me like in the infancy of 2024, the fire is burning white hot.

Well, the first stand is in the books! The Guards departed the Bay Area with 3 in the win column and one tough loss. Bieber made another heroic opening day start and we got an inside look at the type of manager Stephen may be. Here are my three takeaways from the first series of 2024. 

 

  1. THE BATS ARE ALIVE!

Holy moly! I think we can all agree that one of our biggest concerns this year is whether we can hit enough to score runs. Sure, we played the worst team in baseball, but they were major-league pitchers nonetheless and we had no trouble scoring. Believe it or not, Cleveland leads the majors in run differential at +18. 

Another aspect worth mentioning, in game 1 the Guardians scored 6 runs with zero help from the top 3 of the order (Kwan, Jose, and Gime). Kwan and Jose woke up in the 9th to tack on some more, but my point stands, the rest of the boys are hitting. 

 

2.     Bieber is still that guy

Bieber looked as good as he ever has on Opening Day. He gave up 0 runs, 1 walk, punched out 11, and gave up 4 hits, two of them pretty cheap bloops. Perhaps even more exciting, he was hitting 94-95 on the gun. I see Bieber having a CY Young-worthy first half before I cry myself to sleep because we traded him for another shortstop. He just looked like young Biebs again. It was a blast to watch and if somehow you missed it, watch the game on MLB.tv because his outing was *Chef’s Kiss*.

 

3.     Vogt will mix things up

There was a different lineup every game. Vogt mentioned he wanted to use the first series to give everyone a chance to play, so that may have played a part in it. But he also said his goal with every lineup is to beat the starting pitcher. So far, I’m impressed and intrigued. These lineups have made me scratch my head a few times but nothing as bad as Miles Straw starting almost every game last year. I’m a big fan of mixing it up and I feel like Vogt has some tricks up his sleeve this year. He put on a safety squeeze that didn’t end up panning out, but I’m about it. The Guardians lead the league in steals with 8 too so I think we are in for another year of Disgusting Baseball which is glorious. 

 

BONUS: THE VIBES ARE IMMACULATE

I can’t tell if it’s the return of Hedgie and Cookie, if it’s the youth in our new manager, or just excitement for the new season, but the vibes are wild. Over the 4 game set, 3 of which were in a rain storm, the entire dugout was on the top step yelling and cheering the whole game. There is a new “star of the game” tradition going on in the clubhouse where the stand-out Guardian of the day dons a gaudy WWE Guardians belt. Freeman went ballistic when he reached second on the first RBI hit of the year. I don’t know man, call me crazy, but this feels like a scrappy squad. We lost the fire last year, but it feels to me like in the infancy of 2024, the fire is burning white hot. 

 

RESULTS:

Guardians win the first 3 with a run diff of +19. They lost the last game on an implosion by Scott Barlow and Eli Morgan, however, they did come back to tie it 3-3 late in the game. 

 

I hit on the over 5.5 steals (8), and the under on 1.5 errors (1). I did NOT have Steven Kwan hitting a bomb at the Coliseum on my bingo card so I dropped the ball on that one. 

 

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