The Guardians (Still) Aren't a Home Run-Hitting Team
The Cleveland Guardians play one of the unique styles of baseball in MLB. They heavily rely on baserunning, stolen bases, and straight hustle to win games. They found success playing this way last season and made it all the way to the ALDS.
However, there was still one major criticism of this team and that's their lack of any power in the lineup. There was no hiding it in 2022, the Guardians just simply didn't have any pure home run hitters.
Cleveland's front office addressed that over the offseason and signed Josh Bell and Mike Zunino to give the lineup some thump. While these two have helped give the order some more power, the Guardians are still a long way from being a home-run-hitting team.
The Guardians have hit 10 home runs through their first 19 games of the season. That's the second-fewest in baseball and last in the American League. The only team that's hit fewer homers is the Washington Nationals who have eight.
That's a far cry from the Tampa Bay Rays who lead MLB with an astonishing 45 home runs in just 20 games.
Bringing in Bell and Zunino was never going to make this team a top-five power-hitting team in MLB. But there was an expectation that having them in the lineup along with preexisting power hitters like Josh Naylor, Jose Ramirez, and hopefully some more from Oscar Gonzalez, would help these numbers go up.
Currently, the teams home run leader are:
- Naylor - 2
- Ramirez - 2
- Gabriel Arias, Andres Gimenez, Bell, Gonzalez, Amed Rosario, and Zunino each have one.
Hitting home runs wasn't as big of an issue for the Guardians last season because they were still able to score runs and finished right in the middle of MLB's standings.
However, the bats have not gotten going yet in 2023 which has exposed this lack of power. The Guardians have scored 80 runs this season which is in the bottom 10 in the league.
Weather does always slightly play into it. So hopefully, Cleveland's bats will heat up as the summer months also get warmer.
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