American League Division Series Preview: Detroit Tigers vs. Cleveland Guardians

After dispatching the Houston Astros in a two-game Wild Card sweep, the Detroit Tigers’ magical season — their playoff odds sat at just 0.2% on August 11 — continues with a matchup against the Cleveland Guardians in the ALDS. For its part, Cleveland emerged as the winner of the surprisingly tough AL Central, the team’s second division title in the last three years. The Guardians flirted with the best record in the American League for most of the season, but a slow July and August meant that they finished a game and half behind the Yankees for the top seed; they ultimately outperformed their BaseRuns record by 11 games, by far the widest differential in baseball this year, on the back of clutch hitting and a shutdown bullpen.

These two division rivals are well acquainted with each other — Cleveland eked out the regular season series 7-6 — but this will be the first time these storied franchises have met in the postseason. Both teams are extremely young and neither had especially lofty expectations entering the season, but here they are, battling for a spot in the ALCS.

As was true in the Wild Card round, one of the primary questions for the Tigers is how they will deploy their pitching. They got a brilliant start from Tarik Skubal in Game 1 in Houston, then bullpenned their way through Game 2 with the help of seven different pitchers. Now the challenge is figuring out how to take the unorthodox approach that got them through the end of the regular season and past the Astros, and adapt it for the Division Series. Fortunately, the postseason schedule means that Skubal should get two opportunities to pitch this series if it goes all the way to five games, but what they do for the other three games is anyone’s guess.

Both Reese Olson and Casey Mize were on the Wild Card roster, and Detroit will probably bring Keider Montero back for the Division Series. Still, Olson hasn’t pitched past the fourth inning in any of his three regular season starts since returning from a shoulder injury a few weeks ago. Mize, meanwhile, was an effective starter for the Tigers for most of the first half of the season, but missed two months with a hamstring injury and was used as a piggyback option in two of Olson’s starts in late September. The ZiPS game-by-game odds assume that Olson will “start” Game 1, with Montero going in Game 3 and a bullpen game for Game 4:

As you can see, if the Tigers are able to force a Game 5, the series is essentially a coin flip, with the odds slightly favoring Detroit thanks to Skubal. The trick will be to win Skubal’s starts and at least one of Games 1, 3, or 4. Of course, no matter who is listed as the official starter in the non-Skubal games, the Tigers will almost certainly use every available reliever to work through those games. In the Wild Card series, they used eight pitchers out of their bullpen between the two games, with Jason Foley and Jackson Jobe the only ones to allow any runs. Will Vest and Beau Brieske were the standouts, pitching in both games and each earning a save.

The Guardians won’t have to scramble quite as hard to find starters, but the rotation certainly isn’t the main strength of Cleveland’s roster. After Shane Bieber was sidelined by Tommy John surgery in April, Tanner Bibee became the de facto ace of the staff, turning in a solid effort (3.47 ERA, 3.56 FIP, 3.3 WAR) in his second big league season. He improved his strikeout rate by more than two percentage points, lowered his walk rate by 1.5 points, and was a reliable workhorse the entire season. His slider and changeup are both legitimate bat-missing weapons, and his fastball is just good enough to support those secondary pitches.

After Bibee in Game 1, things become a little less clear. Matthew Boyd will certainly make at least one start during the series, and potentially two if Cleveland opts to use him in Game 2 (which would line him up to start a potential Game 5). Boyd returned from Tommy John surgery in August and made eight very impressive starts down the stretch. His fastball velocity is sitting right around where it was at his peak with the Tigers, and his secondary offerings are generating plenty of swings and misses.

For Game 3, the Guardians have a number of options to turn to. The game-by-game odds above assume Alex Cobb will be activated off the IL for this series and make the start, but he’s only made three starts all year and just one in September after dealing with blisters on his throwing hand. Gavin Williams has electric stuff to go along with his prospect pedigree, but he’s struggled with inconsistency, particularly with runners on base, leading to a 4.86 ERA that’s more than a run higher than his 3.67 FIP. There’s also the veteran Ben Lively, whose 3.81 ERA and 4.66 FIP across 29 starts gave Cleveland’s rotation some stability after Bieber’s injury, but he’s not exactly the kind of starter you’d want pitching in a big postseason game. However they lineup their rotation, it’ll be a lot more predictable than the chaos Detroit is trying to harness.

Of course, the Guardians’ true strength lies in their bullpen. Led by Emmanuel Clase, who just had one of the best reliever seasons ever, Cleveland also has a deep stable of setup men who form a bridge from the middle innings to the ninth:

Cade Smith, Hunter Gaddis, and Tim Herrin are as good a setup trio as there is in baseball, and Cleveland’s relief corps as a whole had the sixth-best league- and park-adjusted ERA among the 750 team seasons since 2000. The same expanded schedule that benefits the Tigers’ heavy bullpen usage will also allow manager Stephen Vogt to deploy his ‘pen aggressively should the Guardians take an early lead.

The x-factor on the Guards’ pitching staff is Joey Cantillo, their 13th-ranked prospect. He made his major league debut in late July and has shown some real promise with his changeup and slider, especially across four September starts that saw him pitch to an impressive 2.25 ERA and 1.17 FIP with 29 strikeouts in 20 innings. It’s possible they’ll use him as their Game 3 starter, but it’s more likely that they’ll deploy him as another multi-inning weapon out of the bullpen.

Not only do the Guardians have the more impressive bullpen, they also employ the series’ biggest superstar in José Ramírez. He was a double and a home run away from posting a 40 double, 40 home run, 40 stolen base season, and will certainly receive down-ballot MVP consideration behind Aaron Judge and Bobby Witt Jr. Despite his fantastic track record in the regular season since his breakout 2016, Ramírez has had a rough go of things in the postseason. In 134 plate appearances across 32 playoff games, he’s slashed just .242/.291/.347 (a 70 wRC+) with a pair of home runs. If Cleveland wants to make a deep run in the playoffs, Ramírez will need to be firing on all cylinders.

Steven Kwan and Josh Naylor are the other key members of the Guardians lineup, with the former posting an excellent 131 wRC+ from the leadoff spot while the latter blasted 31 home runs and collected 108 RBIs from the cleanup spot. Both Kwan and Naylor hit left-handed, which puts them at a disadvantage against Skubal. That’s one reason why Cleveland acquired Lane Thomas from the Nationals at the trade deadline — to balance out the lineup with a strong right-handed batter. Thomas got off to a slow start with his new team in August, but produced a 137 wRC+ during the final month of the season.

Cleveland will also hope to see more consistent production out of Jhonkensy Noel. He slumped pretty badly in September, but he was a key member of the lineup during his hot August. His huge raw power gives Cleveland something it has largely lacked the last few years, and one swing from “Big Christmas” could change an entire game.

Because the Tigers will be looking to exploit as many matchups as they can with their relievers, Cleveland’s bench will bear a lot of weight this series:

David Fry, Cleveland’s surprise All-Star, should get starts against the left-handed Skubal, with Noel in the outfield. Beyond those two straight platoons, Vogt will need to pick and choose the right moments to deploy his pinch-hitters to counter A.J. Hinch’s bullpen machinations. The switch-hitting Angel Martínez, in particular, could be the most valuable piece off Cleveland’s bench.

In my preview of the Tigers-Astros Wild Card series, I wrote that Detroit’s offense would need to rely on four key contributors: Kerry Carpenter, Parker Meadows, Riley Greene, and Spencer Torkelson. That quartet collected just four combined hits against Houston, though Meadows’ home run in Game 2 broke the scoreless tie and Carpenter’s single in the eighth started the game-winning rally. Behind those four, the rest of the Tigers lineup collected 13 hits against the Astros, with Torkelson and Colt Keith the only batters to go hitless in the series. Timely hitting was the differentiator; all three runs in Game 1, as well as Andy Ibáñez’s go-ahead, three-run double in Game 2, came with two outs in their respective innings. The Tigers also left a combined 19 runners on base during the series, squandering a number of opportunities to tack a few more crooked numbers on the scoreboard.

The blueprint for both the Tigers and Guardians should look pretty similar: scratch across a few runs early in the game and hand things off to a shut-down bullpen to close things out. With both teams working from the same plan, the series will likely come down to which club can find a timely hit to put themselves ahead. The moves both managers make will have a huge influence on the course of the series. Hinch’s bullpen management has been pretty flawless so far; Vogt will have his own bullpen to manage, along with a bench that should see heavy usage. For fans of nuanced baseball strategy, this series should prove to be a fascinating matchup.