With Cleveland and the Athletics starting in a rain delay, it made for some late afternoon baseball. Gavin Williams took the mound for the Guardians and was on his usual stuff, despite the delay. At the end of the seventh inning, Gavin had only thrown 89 pitches and struck out nine, giving him sole possession of most strikeouts in all of MLB. Jacob Misiorowski, who holds second place, is due to start later today and will reclaim first place barring catastrophe. Gavin ended his night having gone 7.0
innings of scoreless ball. He allowed three hits and a walk and struck out nine. In the top of the sixth, Gavin Williams had a pick off at first for the final out of the inning.
The sole run came in the bottom of the fourth. José led the inning off with a double on a grounder to right. With one out and José on third, Jo Adell hit a swinging bunt that gave José plenty of room to score. There was a bit of a disagreement with the A’s coach, who argued that Adell interfered with the throw to first. The home plate ump and crew chief wanted none of it, ejected the manager, and the game played on.
In the top of the sixth Angel Genao made a great running throw record the first out of the inning.
Hunter Gaddis came in for the top of the eighth. Gaddis struggled with the wind a bit and put two runners on, both in scoring position. With two outs and two on, Vogt went to Cade Smith for the final out. Smith made quick work with a three pitch strike out. Smith closed out the game and looked to be in his full form. He made two quick outs to start the inning, but couldn’t get the final out. A single up the middle was just to hard for José Ramírez to get off to get the runner out at first. It didn’t matter. Cade Smith earned his 39th save of the year, striking out the batter for the final out of the game.
The pitchers were perfect, Vogt pulled the right strings at the right time, and the hitters out hit their opponents. Sure, the weather may have robbed Lowe from an extra base hit or a home run, but this was a game they should have won and they did. Steven Kwan went 3-for-4, José went 2-for-4, and DeLauter went 1-for-3 with a walk. The White Sox are 1.5 games back and also started in a delay today. The current magic number is six to take the division title home and one week of baseball left to do it. Meaningful baseball in September is always a grand time, here’s hoping to lots of champaign in the team’s near future.
