The Cleveland Guardians were once considered one of the best teams in baseball and had one of the best records in MLB, but those days are long gone as their lead in the American League Central has shrunk to just 1.0 game, down from a 9.0 game lead at the end of June.
How is it that a team with one of the best offensive lines in baseball rarely gets a runner around all four bases? It all comes down to taking advantage of runners in scoring position in certain situations.
On the way to the All-Star break, the Guardians were beating .277 with an OPS of .827 with runners in scoring position. They were one of the best teams in baseball in that situation and took advantage of what seemed like every runner on base.
Not to mention, with RISP they only had a strikeout 17.8 percent of the time. They put the ball in play and let the game come to them.
However, that changed in the second half of the season. Since the All-Star break, Cleveland has only had a batting average of .258 and a slugging average of .425 with runners in scoring position.
It’s been a struggle for the Guardians to even get runners on base, and now they’re not even using them when they have them.
Cleveland’s loss in the first game of their doubleheader against the Kansas City Royals is a perfect example of how this situational hitting has affected the Guardians’ season. Cleveland had a lot of baserunners thanks to Cole Ragans’ command issues and the bullpen’s struggle to get outs.
However, the Guardians scored only two earned runs in this game, batted .222 (2-for-9) with runners in scoring position and left 11 men on base.
Cleveland hasn’t lost the division yet, but they’ll have to start scoring again if they want to be AL Central champions at the end of the season.
