They came back in the regular season to win the AL Central, and now they come back to the playoffs to win the ALDS. The Cleveland Guardians are ALCS-bound with their Game 5 win over the Chicago White Sox at rainy Progressive Field on Saturday (CLE 2, CWS 0). The Guardians are the seventh team in the Wild Card era (since 1995) to come back from 0-2 in a best-of-five series.
“Very few people have phenomenal seasons,” Guardians manager Stephen Vogt said after Game 5. “You’re going to go through ups and downs. You’re going to have times where you struggle as a starter. You’re going to have games where you just don’t have it, but you learn from those and you understand, ‘OK, what did I feel, what didn’t work, how can I make sure that doesn’t arrive at an important moment?’ And that’s why you play 162 games. That’s why you stay with the guys. That’s why you believe in guys and give them opportunities. And man, we’ve had so many guys step up over the last five games. It’s incredible.”
The Guardians dropped Games 1 and 2 at home before the offense woke up at Rate Field in Chicago. They scored nine points in Game 3 and another nine points in Game 4. In Game 5, the Guardians scored just enough to complete the return of the series. They are the first team to erase an 0-2 Division Series deficit since the New York Yankees against Cleveland in the 2017 ALDS.
Starters Sean Burke and Gavin Williams gave us a great pitching game in game five. Both teams were hitless through three innings…
…and there were two total hits in four innings. The two teams that combined for 12 runs in Game 3 and 14 runs in Game 4 couldn’t get into the hit column early in Game 5. The White Sox’s best chance to come back in Game 5 came in the sixth inning, when they loaded the bases with two outs. Left-hander Erik Sabrowski struck out Munetaka Murakami to escape the jam.
As recently as August 16, the White Sox had a 5 ½ game lead in the AL Central, and the Guardians were behind by six games. As of this date, Cleveland has gone a better score of 25-12, while the White Sox limped to 19-20. The Guardians definitely took first place on September 16th. It was the second straight year they rallied in the second half to steal the division title.
The White Sox are now 0-2 all-time in winner-take-all playoff games, an incredibly low number of winner-take-all games for a franchise that has been around since 1901. Chicago’s only winner-take-all playoff games are Game 3 of the 2020 Wild Card Series against the then-Oakland Athletics and Game 5 on Saturday. The White Sox lost both.
Now here are three takeaways from Cleveland’s historic Game 5 win over the White Sox.
2026 MLB playoff picture: Schedule, scores as Guardians advance to ALCS with Game 5 win over White Sox
Kate Feldman
1. José Ramírez arrived just in time
It was a trying season for Guardians icon José Ramírez, who missed about six weeks with a hamate injury and had his worst offensive season (by far) since becoming a regular in 2016. He finished the regular season strong, however, going 12-for-38 (.316) with three doubles and a home run in his final nine games, and Ramírez carried that over into the ALDS.
The Guardians reached Game 5 thanks in large part to Ramírez, who had multiple hits in Games 3 and 4 in Chicago, and hit the entire cycle in both games (double and triple in Game 3, single and home run in Game 4). In Game 5, Ramírez provided the game’s only runs with a two-run homer on a golf shot in the fourth inning. How did he make this throw?
It’s also a two-shot playing field. Burke threw the chase curveball he wanted to throw, but Ramírez came down and scooped it over the right-field wall. Burke executed his pitch! He’s just a great hitter who does something most hitters could never do.
Just like Ramírez, so do the Guardians. It sounds simple, and it is, but the simplest things are often the truest. Ramírez went 0 for 6 in Games 1 and 2, both losses for Cleveland. He then went 5-for-12 with four extra-base hits in Games 3-5, all wins for the Guardians. Your best players have to be your best players in October, and Ramírez found himself in form at the right time.
“We all love watching Jose play, and when he shows up like he did, it makes us all better,” Vogt said of his franchise player after Game 5. “He increases the energy. He increases the belief, and I’ve only been able to watch him for three years. I know everyone in Cleveland has been watching him for a long time, but that’s what great players do. That’s what Hall of Famers do.”
2. Big Rig’s Great Game
I’m not sure you can paint a worse matchup on paper for the White Sox. Chicago’s offense had the fifth-highest strikeout rate in baseball during the regular season, while Williams, aka Big Rig, led the American League in strikeouts and had the third-highest strikeout rate in the game. This was the big question facing the ALDS: Could the White Sox put the bat on the ball?
In the fifth game, the answer was no. Williams struck out 12 batters in 5 ⅔ shutout innings, tying Charles Nagy’s franchise single-game postseason strikeout record. At one point, Williams retired 10 straight batters, including seven by strikeout. The White Sox missed 22 of their 50 swings against him for an absurd 44% whiff rate. The MLB average was 25.1% this season.
Keep in mind that Williams closed out Game 4 on Thursday.. There was only one inning and 18 pitches, which equates to one bullpen session between starts, but that’s still playoff intensity and Williams had never been out of the bullpen as a professional. If there had been a carryover effect into game five, it would have been understandable. Instead, Williams dominated.
“I’m just trying to do my job, give the team the best chance to win,” Williams said after Game 5. “And honestly, I was trying to save the pen a little bit. I know they went through that a little bit in the first four games, I guess. So that’s the main thing, just giving the team the best chance to win.”
It wasn’t until Kyle Teel hit a two-out single in the sixth that Chicago got into the hit column against Williams. The White Sox struck out 21 times in Game 5 and struck out 75 times – 75! – throughout the five-game series. This erases the Division Series record. Never before has a team struck out more than 64 times in the best-of-five division series.
3. Cleveland’s pitching is a bit of a mess
The Guardians certainly won’t enter the ALCS with a well-rested pitching staff. Such is life when you play the full five games of the ALDS. Parker Messick and Williams will only be able to start in Games 2 and 3, respectively. Game 1 might go to Foster Griffin, but he heated up with intent in Game 5. Cleveland could consider a bullpen game in Game 1 of the ALCS.
The bullpen was also overloaded. Closer Cade Smith pitched two innings in Game 3, one inning in Game 4 and 1 ⅔ innings in Game 5. He will enter the ALCS having pitched three of the previous five days. The same goes for installer Hunter Gaddis. In terms of pitching, the Guardians will be behind the 8 ball to start the ALCS. They worked hard with all their staff within the ALDS.
To be continued
For the Guardians, it’s the ALCS. They will face the Tampa Bay Rays for the American League pennant. This series begins Monday at Tropicana Field. The White Sox, meanwhile, will return home for the winter after a bitterly disappointing finish and an otherwise overwhelmingly successful season. For the first time in years, the arrow points south.
Gn sports
