CLEVELAND -- Stephen Vogt went to the pitcher’s mound in the sixth inning on Sunday, after Tanner Bibee walked Xander Bogaerts to load the bases with one out. The Guardians’ skipper said he wanted to make sure Bibee (whose pitch count was at 93) was doing well physically.
“I want to let him try to get out of that himself,” Vogt said. “It was just more of a health status check at that pitch count, and everything was fine.”
Three pitches later, on his final offering of the day, Bibee got Padres catcher Freddy Fermin to line into a 3-6 double play to end the threat.
That moment put a bow on Bibee’s outing, but rather than serving as a crucial moment in Sunday’s series finale against the Padres, it was merely a footnote in another disappointing afternoon for Cleveland.
The Guardians lost, 5-0, to the Padres in the rubber match of a three-game series at Progressive Field. Following a three-hour and 11-minute rain delay, Cleveland dropped its fifth straight series and extended its streak without winning a series at home to seven.
The Guardians (60-65) last series win at Progressive Field came vs. the Mariners from June 26-28. That nugget is one of many wrinkles in this continued downward spiral, in which Cleveland has gone 9-19 since the All-Star break, 4-10 in August and 3-9 since the Trade Deadline.
When club brass swung a series of moves at the Deadline to help the Guardians’ push toward securing a postseason spot, it’s hard to imagine anyone saw things playing out the way they have thus far.
“We still have an opportunity in front of us,” Guardians president of baseball operations Chris Antonetti said Sunday morning. “We have to play better baseball. We have not played well over the last few weeks. I think everybody believes we're capable of more. But we need to put it together and play more consistent games, like we did [Saturday].
“That was an encouraging sign, and hopefully, we can continue to stack up more days like that than maybe the prior couple weeks.”
The problem, as we saw after Antonetti spoke, is those games have been fleeting. The Guardians have not shown an ability to get on a run because they have not shown an ability to play complete games consistently. Between Saturday’s 6-1 win were two losses where Cleveland did not play complementary baseball.
The Guardians lost, 7-5, on Friday, as starter Gavin Williams struggled on a productive night offensively. Sunday, Bibee allowed three runs on seven hits and three walks with three strikeouts over six innings. Cleveland tallied just three hits.
For much of the season, you could consistently count on the Guardians’ pitching staff keeping them in games. Lately, it’s been more of a mixed bag.
Guardians offense
July (25 games): 97 runs (23rd in MLB), .690 OPS (22nd)
August (14 games): 61 runs (tied for 15th with Pirates), .715 OPS (tied for 15th with Astros)
Guardians pitching
July: 3.58 ERA (tied for sixth with White Sox), 1.27 WHIP (12th)
August: 4.83 ERA (tied for 25th with Reds), 1.38 WHIP (23rd)
Two tallies off Bibee came via solo homers by Luis Rengifo and Gavin Sheets in the second inning. The Guardians had eight innings’ worth of at-bats to make up that deficit but could not.
“I feel like they didn’t go out and get one of my pitches to hit,” Bibee said. “I threw it down the middle, both of them.”
Bibee picked up his 15th quality start of the season, which is tied with Cam Schlittler for third in the AL and trails only Michael Wacha and Sonny Gray (16 apiece). He also picked up his MLB-leading 13th loss. In 11 of his 15 quality starts, he has received two or fewer runs of support.
“It seems like Sunday and Tanner day have been the starts [where] the weather has just been awful for us,” Vogt said. “It’s awful for the other team, too. But Tanner has definitely had some tough luck on the days he’s pitched this year.”
The Guardians are 1 1/2 games behind the Orioles in the revolving door that is the AL’s final Wild Card spot. Four teams sit between them and Baltimore. With one winning stretch, Cleveland can make a push in this race.
“It’s not really much of a secret that it’s been rough lately,” Bibee said. “At the same time, there's a lot of baseball to be had. The fact that it's swung so far in one direction, it's got to swing back in the other.”