Guardians Starting Pitchers are Facing a Serious Innings Problem
Injuries, slumping starters, you name it — the Guardians’ rotation is underwater
The Guardians pitching staff has gone through the ringer during this young season.
Injuries have been piling up to the point where the team is run-dry of replacements in Columbus. Even rehabbing starting pitchers are facing setbacks in their recoveries. Key arms in Shane Bieber and Trevor Stephan are now out for the season after receiving Tommy John surgery, and people are now speculating whether or not Triston McKenzie is pitching through a lingering elbow injury of his own. Gavin Williams is facing elbow discomfort of his own during rehab and, though it is likely not to be related to the UCL, he still sets his clock back at for at least another week. Altogether, this rotation has been very bogged down by the injury bug that haunted them last year.
Additionally, sophomores Tanner Bibee and Logan T. Allen as well as Triston McKenzie are having troubles of their own trying to get deep into games, with only Allen having the only quality start of the three. The injuries have been a big issue, yes, but I do expect more innings out of this trio. Besides Shane Bieber, only one other Guardians pitcher had a quality start in Ben Lively (even when you count Bieber, they’ll still rank last in the league in the stat).
As a result of all this misfortune with pitcher health, the Guardians have been very bullpen-reliant ever since the start of the season. The rotation is providing little length for their relievers, and that is not good for a team that I don’t even know has a designated long relief pitcher or not. The rotation is third-last in the league in innings pitched since Bieber went down for the year, while the bullpen is seventh.
Beyond innings pitched, the rotation’s efficiency has been living at the bottom of the barrel as well.
- 4.46 xFIP (26th)
- 4.18 BB/9 (26th)
- 17.0° LA (30th)
- 43% HardHit% (27th)
Knowing that the bullpen is carrying their weight and coming in at the top of the rankings in most of these mentioned stats, the Guardians’ pitching staff would be able to lock offenses down if they at least improve to be in the middle of the pack.
By the time Gavin Williams comes back, the Guardians will be looking at a rotation of:
- Tanner Bibee
- Gavin Williams
- Triston McKenzie
- Logan T. Allen
- Ben Lively (my sincerest apologies, Cookie)
I’m thinking that the Guardians could probably manage with this. How Sticks, Allen and Bibee rebound after their slow starts to the season will tell us a lot about what we can expect out of the rotation in terms of innings pitched. I have faith that Tanner can get out of the funk he’s in because we have seen him recover from having early command issues before. McKenzie and Allen, however, I see as wildcards. Triston’s fastball velocity has been all over the place. I’ve even seen his slider velo match that of his four-seam in the same at-bat at 87 last week at Progressive Field. I would consider the possibility that his mechanics are out of whack, but I would rather believe it is more him being careful with his elbow that he hurt in June last year. Of course, Williams is another big cog in the machine, and his return and possible emergence can be critical as the season evolves. Being a former top 10 pitching prospect and first-round pick, it’s imperative that he makes a decent leap this year. As for Logan Allen and Lively, rounding out the bottom of the rotation and providing decent enough pitching to hand the ball over to the bullpen is very helpful.
But back to the main point of this article — in order to maintain the Guardians’ spot at the top of the division, the key is for the rotation to throw more clean innings. That means at least cleaning up the walk problem they’ve put themselves in. Limiting walks will at least add an inning’s worth of length to every start. And more innings means that the bullpen workload is lighter. If the bullpen’s workload is lighter, you have more fresh arms and won’t suffer as many late-inning meltdowns. And if the offense continues to do what they’re doing and score runs, the overall team efficiency is going to increase ten-fold.
I think that there are some reasons for optimism that the Guardians rotation can recuperate in time, even without Shane Bieber. There are plenty of guys in this starting five that are capable of pitching more innings than they are now, and they have shown that capability before. But as we wait for it to happen, things are just going to continue to be hard on the bullpen and the offense when it comes to securing wins. Let’s just hope for the best and enjoy the ride during the wait.