CLEVELAND — In the first inning of the first game the best-of-five American League Division Series matchup between two teams that know each other extremely well, Detroit Tigers manager A.J. Hinch had so much respect (fear?) for the Cleveland Guardians’ bullpen that he made the unusual decision to pull his infield in during a one-run game.
In the first inning. Of the first game. Before the Tigers had even recorded an out.
If there was an early indication of how Detroit feels about facing Cleveland’s all-gas-no-brake relievers in this series, this was it.
“We’re going to see a lot of this bullpen,” Hinch said, with no hint of joy in his voice.
In order for the Guardians to make a deep October run, this is their ideal path to do it. Establish an early lead and get to the majors’ best set of relievers as quickly as possible. There’s no such thing as too early, particularly with all of these off days built into the schedule.
Cleveland relievers produce radar readings that look like Dean’s List test scores: 95, 97, 98, 99. They led all of baseball this year in nearly every statistical category, including ERA. They have both righties and lefties who can overpower hitters and the fact this series has a day off between every game except Games 3 and 4 in Detroit heavily favors Cleveland. Manager Stephen Vogt can be aggressive with how early he gets to the bullpen and how long he can stick with guys knowing they’ll usually have an off day in between appearances.
The Guardians were so good in Game 1 that Vogt didn’t have to overextend any of his guys. An explosive first inning took the pressure off everyone. Tanner Bibee, who was supposed to start last season in Double-A, made his postseason debut and pitched into the fifth in a relatively stress-free environment. Tim Herrin, Cade Smith, Hunter Gaddis and Emmanuel Clase, arms that will be heavily counted on over the next month, flushed any postseason jitters with low-leverage debuts. They combined for 4 1/3 scoreless innings of relief on a day Cleveland pitching piled up 13 strikeouts.
The Tigers struck out 13 or more times in a game only twice since the start of their incredible September run.
Baseball rarely goes according to script, but the Guardians couldn’t have asked for Game 1 to go any smoother.
This is a franchise that made a World Series run in 2016 on the arms of Corey Kluber, Andrew Miller and Cody Allen. They were the only options the franchise could count on, so Terry Francona rode all three to Game 7 of the World Series.
Francona’s use of Miller that postseason could be traced back to the start of the revolution of bullpens and how teams began to rethink how to get to 27 outs.
It was the same formula Vogt followed when he brought Smith into the game in the fifth inning to relieve Bibee. Smith was primarily a late-inning option during the regular season and could be a dominant closer on any team that doesn’t employ Clase. On this team, he is a luxury that Vogt can deploy at any leverage point in any postseason game.
Smith faced four batters Saturday and struck out all of them.
It’s impossible to know what the Guardians will get out of Matthew Boyd and Alex Cobb this month. Neither was even a thought in this organization’s head in April. Further muddying things is how Ben Lively went from regular season darling to off the roster for this series as a mildly surprising omission.
For now, Bibee is the staff anchor and continues to exceed expectations for an organization that keeps pushing him beyond what seems fair and reasonable. He started last season in Triple-A rather than Double-A because of injuries. Even more injuries forced him to Cleveland after just three Triple-A appearances. He never went back.
The more this team heaps on Bibee, the farther he continues to carry them.
The rest is up to a bullpen that is so good, so intimidating, it created matchup issues before a reliever even entered the game.
A leadoff double by Steven Kwan in the first inning, a walk and an error gave the Guardians a 1-0 lead in the bottom of the first with runners at second and third and nobody out.
Rather than concede the run and play for an out, the Tigers essentially pulled the infield in and told a sold-out stadium they couldn’t win if the deficit reached 2-0.
They were right.
(Photo of Cade Smith pitching: Nick Cammett / Getty Images)
