The Cleveland Guardians have been mired in an injury-riddled campaign, leaning heavily on young talent coming up from the minor league system to try and right the ship on the mound as the team’s offense (mostly) scuffles to push across enough runs to win games with any level of consistency.
On the glass-half-full side of things, Cleveland plays in the AL Central. At the time of writing, the Guardians are three games under .500 at 37-40, but still sit just 2.0 games back of the Minnesota Twins for the division lead.
For added context, the Boston Red Sox have a 40-39 record (same as Minnesota at the time of writing), but Boston is dead last in the loaded AL East division and 13.0 games back of the first place Tampa Bay Rays.
So, while not a lot has gone right for Terry Francona’s crew as the weather heats up for the summer months of the season, the Guardians are far from out of the playoff picture if they can find the level of consistency they’ve shown in seasons past.
The latest injury blow in the form of starting pitcher Triston McKenzie being “loosely” shut down from throwing for at least the next month with a UCL sprain in his pitching elbow. It hurts Cleveland’s outlook through the rest of June and beyond. That being said, the Guardians have the aforementioned farm system of young pitching ready to step up to the challenge as Tanner Bibee continues to show in his rookie season.
Guardians pitching news: Meet Gavin Williams, the 16th-ranked prospect in baseball who made his MLB debut
Despite the bad holding them back, the Guardians were up two spots in USA TODAY Sports’ latest power rankings.
See where Cleveland ended up against the rest of Major League Baseball:
1. Tampa Bay Rays (-)
13. Boston Red Sox (-)
-
Corbin Burnes’ strikeouts per nine innings down to 8.49, from 12.61 in his Cy Young-winning 2021 season.
17. Minnesota Twins (-1)
18. San Diego Padres (-)
-
After three games with Nationals, face Rays, Giants, Astros heading into All-Star break.
21. Cleveland Guardians (+2)
-
Looking like a lost year for Triston McKenzie, out at least a month with an elbow sprain, and the offense ranks 26th in the league in OPS — only the Kansas City Royals, Milwaukee Brewers, Detroit Tigers and Oakland Athletics have been worse. Can the Guardians turn it around?
26. Detroit Tigers (-)
27. Washington Nationals (-)
29. Kansas City Royals (-)
30. Oakland Athletics (-)
This article originally appeared on USA TODAY: Cleveland Guardians in USA TODAY’s MLB power rankings: Where they rank