CLEVELAND (AP) — Tanner Bibee couldn’t hold back his tears. Several of his teammates sat nearby in a circle on the floor in a corner of a deathly silent clubhouse, almost afraid to move. There were long hugs, heartfelt whispers.
This isn’t the way it was supposed to end for the Guardians.
Not like this.
Their surprising season came to a sudden finish late Saturday night with a 5-2 loss in 10 innings to the New York Yankees in Game 5 of an American League Championship Series that seemed to have a little bit of everything.
The Guardians, who overachieved by winning 92 regular-season games and the AL Central title, fought their way past division rival Detroit in the ALDS — beating expected Cy Young winner Tarik Skubal in the decisive game — for a shot at the Yankees with their star-studded roster and $300 million-plus payroll.
For five games, Cleveland gave New York all it could handle.
It wasn’t enough.
“They’re just a better team,” said Guardians All-Star left fielder Steven Kwan. “Because we’re so close in all those games, I think that’s what makes this sting a little more. Yeah, it was a great year. Kind of hard to be able to look back right now. It’s still so fresh. It hurts pretty bad right now.”
History will show the Yankees won in five games, but the series was tighter than that and could have flipped Cleveland’s way.
The Guardians had their chances, so many chances. They put pressure on the Yankees in every game, but couldn’t come up with big hits in key spots. The moments were there for them to seize and they let them slip by.
The club’s World Series title drought — going back to 1948 — got another year older.
Cleveland left 47 runners on base, finishing 9 of 47 (.191) with runners in scoring position. There will be at-bats that haunt them all winter.
All season long, their aggressive style — “Guards Ball” as it became known — under first-year manager Stephen Vogt rarely materialized against the Yankees, who used their bigger bats to outslug them. New York hit two homers in Game 5 while Cleveland managed just a pair of RBI singles.
But the biggest failure by far was Cleveland’s vaunted bullpen, which was baseball’s best from April to September but not nearly as good in October.
All-Star closer Emmanuel Clase nearly blew Game 3 but got bailed out and then collapsed in Game 4, giving up two runs in the ninth inning.
Clase regrouped in Game 5, but this time it was Hunter Gaddis, who allowed Juan Soto’s three-run homer in the 10th inning as the Yankees ended Cleveland’s season in the playoffs for the second time in three years.
“Some of the best hitters in the world got us in this series,” Vogt said. “That’s true.”’
Not long after watching the Yankees celebrate on the Guardians’ home field, Vogt, the journeyman catcher who was hired by Cleveland last December despite not having any managerial experience, told his players to keep their heads held high.
His message was simple.
“Remember this feeling,” he told them. “Remember this feeling you have right now because there’s more left on the table for this group. We know we can accomplish more, but be proud of what we accomplished overall and use this to fuel your offseason.”
There was raw emotion throughout Cleveland’s clubhouse as players processed that their time together was over. They had grown closer, probably closer that any of them expected during a run no one outside Cleveland saw coming.
Bibee, who rebounded from being pulled in Game 2 after 39 pitches to hold the Yankees to two runs in 5 2/3 innings in Game 5, struggled to complete a sentence without breaking down in tears.
This wasn’t the time to dissect every detail or point fingers or think about anything other than supporting each other.
“There’s so many little things that happen,” said All-Star David Fry, who hit a walk-homer in the 10th to win Game 3. “You can overanalyze it all day, but we feel like we’re so prepared that we don’t have to look back and like, oh, I wish I would’ve done this better. We were ready and just didn’t go out our way.”
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