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Editor, News-Register:
As a longtime fan of the Cleveland Major League Baseball franchise, now known as the Guardians, but from 1915-2021 as the Cleveland Indians, I was quite pleased and encouraged by the team's fine performance on the diamond during the most recent 2022 season.
The Guardians, 29th out of 30 Major League teams in payroll, were picked preseason by most pundits to finish in either third or fourth place out of five teams in the American League Central Division following their 80-82 won-loss record the previous season and with 2022 considered to be a "rebuilding year." The Guardian surprisingly outperformed all expectations by winning the AL Central by 11 games over their nearest competitor, the Chicago White Sox, finishing the regular season with a 92-71 record which included their winning of 20 for the final 30 games to close the regular season. They completed the regular season with the third-best winning percentage in the American League, behind only the Houston Astros and New York Yankees respectively. Cleveland played well enough in the regular season to qualify to compete in the postseason, just as it did in 13 of the previous 28 seasons. Current manager and future Hall of Famer Terry Francona who has been at the helm since 2013 and led Cleveland to the postseason in 2013, 2015, 2016 (which included a trip to the World Series) 2017 and 2018 as well as the 2022 season. However, Manager Francona was forced to miss much of the 2020 and 2021 seasons due to serious health issues, which have since been resolved.
The Guardians, who were by far the youngest team in the Major Leagues as well as Triple-A minor league baseball, had 17 players who made their major league debut during the 2022 season won a league leading 29 games in their final at bat, along with 40 come from behind wins.
Cleveland batters struck out a league low 1,122 times and had a fine .254 batting average as well as an excellent team earned run average of 3.46. In the postseason, the Guardians swept the Tampa Bay Rays, two games to none in their best of three series, before losing to the New York Yankees in their five game series. Although Guardian pitchers held the Yankees to a low .182 batting average, they were out homered nine to three and thus fell to the Yankees three games to two.
It definitely appears that the prospects of a bright future for baseball and Cleveland are quite bright.
Indeed.
Richard Hord
Martins Ferry