Are The Cleveland Guardians Terry Francona’s Finest Hour As A Major League Manager?

FanGraphs’ Projected wins for projected division winners in Major League Baseball this season: Dodgers 110, Mets 102, Astros 101, Yankees 96, Cardinals 93, Guardians 85.

It is, moreover, very likely that all six wildcard teams (three in each league) will win more games this year than the potential AL Central champion Cleveland Guardians.

Manager Terry Francona’s overachievers scare no one, but they can beat anyone. They’ve been doing it all year, they are doing it now, and there’s no reason to believe that they won’t continue to do it over their last 36 regular season games, all but 12 of which will be played at home.

At the start of this season nobody saw a division title for Cleveland, and they still haven’t won it. But regardless of how the AL Central race turns out, an argument could be made that 2022 is Francona’s finest hour as a major league manager.

In his 22 seasons as a big-league manager for the Phillies (four years), Red Sox (eight years), and Guardians (10 years), Francona has won two Manager of the Year Awards, both with Cleveland (2013, 2016). He won two World Series with Boston (2004, 2007), and an American League pennant with Cleveland in 2016.

All of those teams had more talent than Francona’s 2022 Guardians, who at the beginning of this season were on nobody’s postseason radar. But under Francona’s deft hand, Cleveland has bobbed and weaved its way into a legitimate postseason contender.

If you’re trying to figure out how the newly-minted Guardians have been able to ascend to the top of the AL Central this year, don’t bother. Sometimes these things just happen. It’s the beauty of baseball. The long season, the ups and downs, the inexplicable runs of hot and cold by teams more than capable of careening dramatically in either direction.

But Cleveland’s success doesn’t happen without the steadying leadership of an experienced manager, and Francona has taken a team with one of the lowest payrolls in the game, and turned it into one of the surprise stories of 2022.

On May 29 the Guardians, with a record of 19-24, were gathering dust in third place in the AL Central, 7.5 games out of first. Three months, and a run of 48-35 later, Cleveland’s feisty Guardians are 67-59, and in first place in their division, 1.5 games ahead of Minnesota, with 36 games left to play.

Cleveland is doing it under a future Hall of Fame manager plus an eclectic cast of performers who have blown both hot and cold this year, plus some emerging and impressive newcomers who have quietly steadied the ship, allowing Cleveland to stay atop baseball’s weakest division.

The Guardians’ offense is led by third baseman Jose Ramirez, second baseman Andres Gimenez, and rookie left fielder Steven Kwan. Ramirez leads the league in doubles and is hitting .283, with 26 home runs, and his 106 RBI are second only to Aaron Judge.

Only two players in the American League have a higher WAR than Gimenez’s 5.4. Their names: Judge and Shohei Ohtani. Gimenez is also fourth in the league with a .302 batting average, and fourth in defensive WAR.

Kwan is that rarest of rookies who not only hits leadoff, but has more walks than strikeouts, is also among the league leaders in hitting (.298) and on-base percentage (.372), and is the second-hardest hitter in the league to strike out, at 9.1 plate appearances per strikeout.

Cleveland’s rotation is led by Shane Bieber, Cal Quantrill, and Triston McKenzie, each of whom have ERAs under 3.60. McKenzie has given up the fourth-fewest hits per nine innings in the league, Bieber is in the top 10 in most pitching categories, and Quantrill, the staff’s biggest winner (10-5), is undefeated in 38 career appearances at Progressive Field (11-0, 2.85 ERA).

The Guardians’ ironclad relievers are one of the best groups in the league, with a 3.18 ERA while holding opposing batters to a .216 batting average. All-Star closer Emmanuel Clase has a 1.17 ERA, while limiting opponents to a batting average of .153.

But the ringleader is Francona, whose feisty hitters, who play the game the right way, rarely strike out, consistently put the ball in play, and run hard to first all the time. Despite their youth – they are not only the youngest team in the majors, but younger than any Triple-A team – they rarely beat themselves.

That formula, with an assist from the schedule maker, has positioned the first-place Guardians for a potential sixth trip to the postseason in Francona’s 10 years as manager.

If it goes down to the wire, Cleveland has to like its chances. The Guardians’ last six regular season games, all at home, will be played against the Kansas City Royals, a team that, in 10 games this season, the Guardians have outscored 64-30.