Tigers vs. Guardians Prediction
One AL Central team in the ALDS wouldn’t have been a big surprise. Two would have been a shocker. Three would have been unfathomable. But, that’s precisely what we’ve got here and an AL Central team is guaranteed to play in the ALCS because the No. 2 seed Cleveland Guardians take on the No. 6 seed Detroit Tigers.
The MLB Playoffs are an annual example of what can happen with small sample size variance, but talking about that does diminish what the Tigers have done. They held the Astros to three runs over two games at Minute Maid Park and roared back from the depths of playoff probability hell to make the postseason.
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Cleveland had some moments of concern in the division race, but ultimately won it by 6.5 games over the Royals. The division chase was tied on August 27 and Cleveland opened up as much as a 7.5-game lead during the last week of the season.
I do think there’s something to be said about what the Tigers had to do in the regular season and it carrying over to the postseason. There are also questions for the teams with the byes about whether or not the extended layoff is good. With the rainout on the final day of the regular season, the Guardians won’t have played for a week by the time first pitch rolls around on Saturday.
Let’s preview this series, the likely pitching matchups, and find some bets.
Tigers vs. Guardians ALDS Schedule
Game 1: Saturday October 5, 1:08 p.m. ET (Skubal vs. Bibee)
Game 2: Monday October 7, 4:08 p.m. ET (Holton vs. Boyd)
Game 3: Wednesday October 9, TBD (Williams vs. Chaos)
Game 4: Thursday October 10, TBD (Bibee vs. Skubal) (if necessary)
Game 5: Saturday October 12, TBD (Holton vs. Boyd) (if necessary)
(all pitching matchups are projected by me until otherwise announced)
How To Watch Tigers vs. Guardians
All games on TBS (some on truTV or Max)
Tigers vs. Guardians Series Odds
Detroit Tigers +105 // Cleveland Guardians -125
Over/Under 3.5 Games: -330 // +265
Over/Under 4.5 Games: +145 // -180
Tigers vs. Guardians ALDS Preview
For what it’s worth (IMO, not much), the Guardians won the season series 7-6 over the Tigers, but were outscored 60-50. Cleveland had losses of 10-1 and 8-2 to the Tigers to explain the big run differential gap. They also haven’t played since July 30. A lot has happened since then.
The bullpens are the starting point for this series. They are both excellent. One is better. In fact, one is arguably the best bullpen I’ve ever seen. Emmanuel Clase won’t win the Cy Young, but you could argue that he should finish a lot closer to Tarik Skubal than he will. Clase had a 0.61 ERA with 47 saves in 74.1 innings of work. He actually didn’t rack up a ton of strikeouts, so his FIP and xERA were a little bit higher and those negatively impacted his fWAR, but it was one of the most dominant relief seasons in recent memory.
If we pick an arbitrary start date of 2009 and look at the last 15 years of bullpens, Cleveland’s ranks third in ERA and 24th in FIP out of 480 relief seasons. Their .267 wOBA against also ranks as the third-best. Detroit’s 2024 bullpen ranks 123rd in ERA in that sample and fifth for this season. These are two strong relief units, but Cleveland’s was the best in baseball by a significant margin.
The irony is that both of these teams are weak in the starting pitcher department. Skubal makes up for a lot of Detroit’s deficiencies, but as we are, they needed a reliever in Tyler Holton to start Game 2 for them in a full-fledged bullpen game. I’m guessing that they were holding Reese Olson back for a potential Game 3 to have a bit of length, but we even saw manager A.J. Hinch turn the ball over to rookie Jackson Jobe in a huge spot in the seventh inning of Game 2. It did not work out, but Hinch is creative and he has to be with this staff.
If the Tigers turn to Skubal in Game 1, they’ll be doing so on one day’s short of rest, as he pitched on Tuesday in Game 1 of the AL Wild Card Round. They could run back the Holton + bullpen day and feel comfortable with that. Skubal, who fired six shutout innings in his first-ever postseason start, had a 2.39 ERA with a 2.70 xERA and a 2.49 FIP in 192 innings. Team vs. pitcher stats are wholly irrelevant because the sample sizes aren’t big enough, but for those wondering, Skubal allowed one run on 10 hits over seven innings in his only start against Cleveland this season.
Olson had a 3.53 ERA with a 3.51 xERA and a 3.17 FIP, so he’s not a bad arm at all, but he missed about two months and only made three starts to finish the regular season with seven runs allowed on nine hits in 9.1 innings.
Bibee will be the Game 1 starter for Cleveland, but he, like all Cleveland starters, will have a quick hook if need be. Bibee posted a 3.47 ERA with a 3.80 xERA and a 3.56 FIP in 173.2 innings of work. He was better in the second half than he was in the first half and had a 2.64 ERA over his final 30.2 innings.
I would expect former Tiger Matthew Boyd to get the Game 2 nod. The Guardians also have Gavin Williams and Alex Cobb in the mix. I think we may see Vogt “MacGyver” this thing together, possibly using an opener in front of Williams as a bulk guy and a similar thing with Cobb, who had a finger blister last in the season and hasn’t pitched since September 1. I don’t think Cobb makes the ALDS roster, but if Cleveland advances, I think he’d make the ALCS roster where you need more starting pitcher depth.
Joey Cantillo is another long relief option after storming back onto the scene in September with a .192/.250/.274 slash against and a 2.25 ERA over his final 20 innings of work. Nothing about the pitching usage in this series will be conventional beyond the Skubal and Bibee starts.
Offensively, Cleveland’s best attribute is not striking out. While they added some good power production this season relative to last season, they put a ton of balls in play and have a lot of above average baserunners that can take extra bases and steal some bags. This is also an outstanding defensive team, if we’re examining the position player groups for strengths and weaknesses.
Cleveland’s weakness is that the lineup is not deep and the run producers are few and far between. The overall contact authority is really poor for the Guardians. The bottom of the order is quite bad.
However, some contact is better than no contact and the Tigers had a 22.5% K% in the 13 games against Cleveland, while the Guardians had a 19.5% K% against Detroit pitching. For the season as a whole, Cleveland struck out 20.2% of the time and the Tigers struck out 24.3% of the time.
Personally, I find the -125 price on Cleveland to be a little bit short. Both Vogt and Hinch are top-tier managers, though I really do love how the first-year skipper leveraged Cleveland’s bullpen and also situational hitting late in games.
Cleveland stole nearly twice as many bases, hit 23 more home runs, and made more contact. They may get Skubal twice because of the off days, and that’s clearly a worry, but the Guardians are just a better all-around team in my estimation and their bullpen is a true difference maker.
Pick: Guardians -125
