CLEVELAND -- Major League Baseball has postponed Game 4 of the ALCS due to rain in Cleveland, pushing the Guardians and Rays back a day in their series.
Game 4 is now scheduled for Saturday at 8 p.m. ET with Game 5 now on Sunday, which was originally scheduled as an off-day, at 5 p.m. ET. That off-day now disappears, meaning a potential Game 6 would be Monday in St. Petersburg at Tropicana Field.
“I think the rain didn't change. It never cleared out the way they were hoping it would,” said Rays manager Kevin Cash. “It started to get later in the hour, and MLB and I think both clubs did everything they could to try to get it in. It made the most sense at this point and this hour, with no guarantee that there wasn't another band coming."
As the rains picked up through the afternoon, there wasn’t much action on the field with most players choosing to stay inside to wait it out. A group of Rays pitchers came out to play catch at one point just prior to the originally scheduled first pitch time of 8 p.m. ET, but quickly retreated to the clubhouse again. Cleveland’s grounds crew cleared the water off the infield tarp at one point and was working to clear the pools of water on the outfield warning track, but the rain kept coming.
“It's completely out of our control,” said Guardians manager Stephen Vogt. “Our guys hung out today. We got some work in, obviously. We didn't just sit around all day. But it was obviously a long day to wait to not have a game. But this is what happens. This is baseball. This is Cleveland. We're more than used to these kinds of days.”
With the Guardians up 2-1 in the series, they still have the opportunity to punch their ticket to the World Series at home with two more wins. The winner of this series will go on to face the Brewers, who swept the two-time defending World Series champion Dodgers on Thursday night.
The forecast for the rest of the weekend in Cleveland looks much better, so there are not expected to be any further disruptions to the schedule.
Fans who held tickets for the original Game 4 on Friday may use those tickets for Game 5 on Sunday. Fans who had tickets to the originally scheduled Game 5 Saturday, which now shifts to being Game 4, do not need to take any action and those tickets will stand.
This change could obviously have an impact on each team’s pitching plans in the coming days, but for now, everything will stay as is for Saturday. Nick Martinez remains the scheduled starter for the Rays and Shawn Armstrong will still open for the Guardians, expected to be followed by a bullpen game.
From there, each team’s options swing wide open for Game 5 and beyond. The Rays should have ace Drew Rasmussen available, along with Freddy Peralta, who’s coming off a great performance in Game 2 of this series. On the Guardians’ side, Parker Messick could be available for Game 5 on regular rest, and could be followed again by Gavin Williams, who’s been Cleveland’s postseason star during this run. For now, though, everything from Friday is bumped back one day to Saturday.
Both bullpens will be fresh, too, which could be particularly valuable for the Guardians, who have leaned heavily on closer Cade Smith and setup man Hunter Gaddis through their ALDS comeback against the White Sox and this ALCS against the Guardians.
It’s also reasonable to expect that some of Friday’s lineup decisions from the rained-out Game 4 will carry over to Saturday. The most notable change came in the Rays lineup, where Chandler Simpson was scheduled to bat third behind Yandy Díaz and Jonathan Aranda. Cash and the Rays love the fit of Simpson’s contact and elite speed in the middle of the lineup -- even if it’s miles from the typical power profile you see in the No. 3 spot -- and he also presents a different look in front of Junior Caminero, who the Rays need to get going in the cleanup spot after a slow start to the ALCS.
Saturday’s forecast in Cleveland will still look and feel a lot like October baseball, with temperatures projected to drop near 40 degrees later in the evening, but there is no heavy rain currently projected.