ST. PETERSBURG – The Guardians have landed the first punch in the ALCS, stunning the widely favored Rays with a come-from-behind win in Game 1 on Monday night.
The Guardians’ 7-3 win looked so much different for the first six innings, with the Rays in full control and playing their famous, airtight brand of baseball. Once that door cracked open, though, the Guardians burst through with the combination of power and timely hitting that got them here in the first place.
That’s four consecutive wins now for the Guardians, who in the ALDS became just the 11th team to lose the first two games of a best-of-five postseason series but then come back to win it. The Rays are a perennial powerhouse and the top team in the American League by a wide margin coming off a 98-win season, but now they’re the team playing from behind after Game 1.
Home runs from Chase DeLauter and Patrick Bailey initially tied the game for the Guardians, and Bailey’s big swing will be the one held under a microscope until we all move on to Game 2 Tuesday night.
Rays ace Drew Rasmussen was at 90 pitches through six innings and looked excellent outside of DeLauter’s opposite-field shot, but when the Rays chose to bring Rasmussen back out for the seventh, Bailey sent the first pitch he saw 436 feet to right-center, the longest of his MLB career.
Nathaniel Lowe delivered the big blow, though, with a two-run single up the gut to score DeLauter and José Ramírez in the eighth and finally put the Guardians in front. A three-run Cleveland ninth provided the final margin.
That swing stole a win from the Rays, who for much of the evening looked like they’d cruise to a win built on all their greatest strengths. The Guardians beat the Rays at their own game, though, even if it took some time to get the game to their sweet spot with a great performance from the bullpen. Behind four innings of two-run ball from Foster Griffin, Daniel Espino, Joey Cantillo, Hunter Gaddis and Erik Sabrowski gave the Guardians one inning of relief each, setting up Cade Smith for the ninth.
In a series between such similar organizations, both analytically minded and built around excellent pitching and defense, don’t expect to see any 10-0 blowouts. This series profiles to be tight and tense, which is why it’s incredibly important that the Guardians have stolen at least one game here with Games 3-5 all waiting for them at home in Cleveland.
No matter how this ALCS shakes out, the American League’s representative in the World Series will be chasing history. The Rays are far younger as an organization, having entered the league in 1998, but have never won the World Series and have been only twice (2008, 2020). The Guardians’ infamous title drought, on the other hand, sits at 77 seasons, the longest in MLB.
In all best-of-seven postseason series, teams that have taken a 1-0 lead have gone on to win the series 127 of 197 times (64%). In series with the current 2-3-2 format, teams that have taken a 1-0 lead on the road have gone on to win the series 41 of 73 times (56%).