Truly top to bottom, this was Cleveland Gaurdians taking the Rays to school. The pioneers of dragging old school small ball baseball into the modern era kicking and screaming show why the original is oftentimes the best.
Matchups make fights, and one thing is certain after tonight: the Cleveland Guardians are a much scarier and intimidating matchup than the New York Yankees ever were.
Cleveland played an extremely Guardian and Rays style of game, and just beat the Rays to the punch. They were able
to come through with the big hits from the unlikely sources at the bottom of the order. They had their young slugger have a tremendous breakout game. They got sharp pitching from start to pen keeping Rays hitters off balance and without any real threat for the majority of the night.
Overall, the first ALCS game played in the Trop in 18 years was an abysmal disappointment and at several times truly embarrassing night. It was so bad, that late in this game I was cursing the Catholic heavens for abandoning their chosen sons of the White Sox, in letting the Guardians advance.
Rays were able to come out looking not at all rusty, jumping all over Foster Griffin. Yandy jumped out with a blistering double directly to and past Kwan in LF. Aranda next in extremely Rays fashion dropped down a pure sac bunt, setting up Junior Caminero with a sharp single past the drawn in infield to get the Rays up early 1-0. Singles from Victor Mesa JR and then Johnny DeLuca would add on and push the Rays lead to 2-0.
That would be it for the Rays after Taylor Walls struck out on 3 pitches.
And ultimately that would be the best threat the Rays would mount the rest of the night. 4 hits and 5 total baserunners for that 1st inning, while the rest of the game the Rays would only generate another 3 hits and 2 baserunners.
On the pitching side, you knew runs would be hard to come by for both clubs. Rasmussen didn’t need more than 1 last time out, but this ain’t the Yankees. leveland to their credit made Rasmussen work all night. Ras took a bit to get into his groove, and the Guards hitters were fouling off pitches everywhere. Cleveland came in with a good gameplan and they were putting on some good swings on Ras.
To his credit, and the reason Rasmussen is an ace, he battled and kept the Rays in this game. Hard contact and some nifty glovework behind him, Rasmussen would get through 5 innings scoreless.
When a pitcher doesn’t have their best stuff, the ability to battle and grind it out, make the key pitches to just give your team a chance is so huge. Rasmussen showed the flashes of the true ace, but his grinding was much appreciated and was the only reason the Rays had even a fleeting hope of winning this game.
In the 6th Rasmussen would finally get tagged for a run, with Chase DeLauter (who had a mosnter game) would take a high fastball the otherway for a solo bomb.
After that though, Ras would buckle down and get through the 6th keeping the Rays in the lead.
Kevin Cash is known for a lot of things, but perhaps the most is his quick hook with starters. We have litigated the Blake Snell World Series Game 4 decisions for years, and while I still contend it was the right call, tonight we can maybe see some more evidence of why that is.
To the shock of most: Rasmussen would come out for the 7th. He’d have a battle of a night, giving up screaming contact, which thankfully most found gloves. Often the old adage of better to be a batter early than a batter late in pulling a starter, and well Cash left Ras in for what turned out to be one batter too many.
I do think the situation of this being game 1 of a 7 game series and Rasmussen being basically the only starter you can count on to give length, makes this choice a bit tricky for Cash. You have a well somewhat over-rested bullpen. It’s also a bullpen that is significantly worse than every remaining bullpen in the playoffs by most metrics. Ras was set to face the bottom of the Guardians order, which he had handled very smooth earlier in the game.
Patrick Bailey just hit the longest HR of his career to tie the game and suck the entire life out of Tropicana Field. At some point you can only tip your cap. But you can also see why Cash has in the past really leaned on being agressive with his hook.
The second half of the inning the Rays had a chance to respond. You show a lot of character in how you handle adversity. How do you respond to giving up the lead?
Rays had a pinch hitting Liam Hicks, Yandy Diaz, Jonathan Aranda, and Junior Caminero to respond. Hicks and Aranda would line and fly out missing their pitches. Yandy would single, and set up Junior Caminero to face Hunter Gaddis and see if he can re-find that power stroke that has eluded him for weeks. And well, it eludes him for longer.
Gaddis pitched him really cool. Using his changeup that he rarely uses ever vs righties, he was able to get strike one with a floating change that Junior watched. He finished it off with a cookie of a change-up right into the center that Caminero whiffed on that I can’t help but think over on the Guards side Jose Ramirez or DeLauter would have served into the Ray Tank.
After that, all life was gone from this home crowd. Still a tied game, at home, but seeing their young superstar strikeout, lead get surrendered, and generally feel on the ropes it just seemed that darkness loomed.
Top of the 8th Tyler Wells would make his first appearance in weeks after his late season injury. One of the key trade deadline acquisitions, Wells was nails all second half until the arm fatigue set in. He was not as sharp tonight, facing Jose Ramirez (who singled) and then DeLauter (who doubled) immediately the Rays were into danger zone.
Wells was able to get the sharp grounder right into the drawn in infield to keep Ramirez at 3rd and the score tied. Wells would then depart, for Ian Seymour to face up a lefty lefty matchup vs former Ray Nathaniel Lowe.
On an 0-2 pitch, Seymour could not elevate the fastball enough and Lowe would break the game open with a 2 run single giving the Rays their first deficit of the 2026 postseason.
The bottom half of the inning would provide the last spark of life and joy for the Rays, when out of nowhere Cedric Mullins would deliver his own lefty on lefty 2 strike magic with a solo HR to bring the Rays within a run.
Unfortunately, that indeed was it for the Rays and it would only get uglier and more humiliating from there.
Top of the 9th, Cole Sulser would get the ball and not do much good with it. Base hit, balk, and then a scary outfield crash and the 2nd best hit of the night for Caminero.
Neither Caminero or DeLuca would come out of the game, so looks like this was one element of luck that went the Rays way. But that would be it, as Sulser got two more outs, and then proceed to get beat again by the great Jose Ramirez.
And then from bad to worse as Kevin Kelly would get the grounder he was looking for against Jo Adel, but Jose Ramirez fully tricked Junior Caminero into covering 3rd for some unknown reason, allowing the grounder to roll on by and balloon the lead to an insurmountable 7-3.
Easy and short 9th from Cade Smith would send the Rays bats down without any threat, giving Cleveland a huge game 1 win in St Pete.
In the postseason, especially in the ALCS, you cannot play sloppy ball. You cannot pitch poorly. And you have to have your stars come through with some big hits. Rays could not get any of that to happen, and the Guardians did all of that.
Cleveland deserved to win game 1. They were the far and away better team in every aspect of the game. What is slightly dispiriting is, it didn’t feel nearly as close as the score was for the majority of this one.
Maybe that’s the good thing and a positive to take away. The Rays nearly won this game if they make some better bullpen choices, or played sharper defense, or gotten at he big hit when it came around. The moments were there, and there’s a world where they are able to hold the 2-1 lead or even keep it tied and win in extras.
If the Rays are to get back into this series, and give the Guardians the fight they deserve, they are going to have to play much better in every way.
The Rays need to figure out a way to beat a left handed starter, a struggle they have had all season.
The Rays bullpen needs to be sharper, a struggle they have had all season.
Up next is Parker Messick, another left handed pitcher, Plant City native and former Seminole, getting the start for Cleveland tomorrow night.
This is a 7 game series. It’s a long series and this is just game 1. But if the Rays can’t find a way to give a hell of a better effort, it’s not gonna be that long.
