Well. Gavin Williams was great today! Not in the way he normally is, but he pitched to contact and managed to put together 7 great innings of 1-run ball. Something interesting to note with him these last two starts is his pitch usage. Both of his last two starts have been caught by Hedges, and both have featured uncharacteristically high breaking ball-usage. Against the Phillies, he threw nearly 70% curveball/sweeper, and only went to his 4-seam 11% of the time. He instead threw his sinker 25% of the time. His
sweeper had a 62% whiff rate in that start. In the 3 starts preceding that, his fastball was getting killed. He re-introduced his cutter which partially helped, but the sweeper/curveball usage drove down the quality of contact allowed on his 4-seam. That pattern continued today. Gavin was 47% curveball/sweeper today, almost 50% of the time the first time through the order. Felt like he didn’t have great feel for either today, which would explain the decreased usage. Nevertheless, Gavin was fantastic today. He provided a start the Guardians bullpen desperately needed after two abhorrent performances from Bibee and Cantillo in the two days prior. To refresh your memory, those two combined for 5 innings and 11 (eleven) earned runs allowed.
Gavin’s only run came off a C.J. Abrams 2-out RBI double in the 3rd on a, well, questionable 0-2 fastball call from Hedges. The offense finally seemed to wake up today, going 10/32 as a unit with 3 walks to 2 strikeouts.
Bazzana was fantastic, going 2/4 with 2 laced doubles to center. He nearly added a homer to that line, but was robbed by James Wood.
DeLauter (hopefully) is waking up, as he went 2/4 with an unlucky lineout to right in the 1st.
The metaphorical floodgates finally opened up for the Guardians in the 5th with this sequence to both score and give the Guardians the lead.
Herrin struck out two in his only inning of work and walked none.
Cade got BABIP’d in the 9th, unfortunately giving up a run. However, he struck out the last two Nationals after that run scored to close out the game.
The Guardians improve to 33-25 as Boston comes to town for a 3-game set this weekend.
It’ll be Bello vs. Cecconi on Friday.
