CLEVELAND -- How you view the Guardians’ position in the revolving door that is the American League postseason picture depends on if you’re a glass-half-full or a glass-half-empty person. What we can all agree on is there is at least some time left this season.
“I know where we're at,” Guardians manager Stephen Vogt said. “But there's a lot of baseball left.”
The Guardians have been mired in an inconsistent and frustrating stretch of baseball in which they lost 20 of their first 30 games after the All-Star break. Cleveland entered Thursday 61-66, and it sat 1 1/2 games back of the final AL Wild Card spot thanks to a stretch of five consecutive series losses.
Thursday offered some progress. The Guardians beat the Giants, 5-2, in the rubber match of a three-game set at Progressive Field behind another strong outing by Gavin Williams. The big right-hander struck out 11 batters over 5 2/3 innings, in which he allowed two runs on four hits and three walks.
San Francisco’s only tallies off Williams came on a Willy Adames two-run homer in the fourth inning.
Thursday marked Williams’ ninth double-digit strikeout game this season, which is tied with Toronto’s Dylan Cease for second most in MLB behind Jacob Misiorowski. It’s the most such games by a Cleveland pitcher since Trevor Bauer in 2018 (10).
Williams has 201 strikeouts in 154 2/3 innings over 26 starts this season. He’s the first Cleveland pitcher with 200-plus punchouts in a campaign since Shane Bieber had 259 in 214 1/3 innings over 34 games (including 33 starts) in 2019.
The Guardians jumped out to a 3-0 lead in the first inning while sending eight batters to the plate. José Ramírez opened the scoring with an RBI single, which was his 1,751st career hit. He is now tied with Charlie Jamieson for fifth most in franchise history.