The Time is Now for the Guardians, Paul

Speaking to the majority owner of the Cleveland Guardians

Paul Dolan, I’m sure you’re not reading this article. But, I’m going to write it anyway.

I want to begin by saying that I do not hate you. I think you’re fine as an owner. I believe you, generally-speaking, invest a decent portion of the revenue that you receive from your baseball team back into the team (we have now way of KNOWING what that percentage actually is, so this is mostly an educated guess). I really appreciate that you seem genuinely committed to keeping the Guardians in Cleveland. I appreciate that, after dragging your feet for a long time, you recognized it was time to move on from Chief Wahoo and the “Indians” monikor and the replacement choice has been a very good one. I really appreciate how you seem to hire good people and leave them alone to do their jobs (with the financial restrictions you impose in place), retaining excellent talent like Chris Antonetti and Mike Chernoff far beyond what anyone would have expected. I appreciate that even though it required Jose Ramirez to go 90% of the way, you at least went the 10% to keep my all-time favorite Cleveland baseball player here. I think you’re the best owner in Cleveland, though we may finally see if Dan Gilbert can oversee the winning of a championship without Lebron James putting the franchise on his back. Thank you for not being Jimmy Haslam, in other words.

I wish you’d grant an interview with a good journalist like Zack Meisel, but it doesn’t look like that’s ever going to happen again after the “enjoy him” fiasco. I’d like to hear you defend the payroll choices you’ve made and explain just how committed you are to breaking the World Series drought in Cleveland which has now stretched to 76 years. I know that you are heavily involved in charitable work, including in the Dominican; it would be nice to hear you talk about some of that, but then it would also be nice to hear you answer questions about whether your brother’s failed Senate run affected your spending plans in 2024 at all. Alas, I’m sure that’s not happening.

This coming season will be the first year that I’ve financially and time-wise been able to justify becoming a season-ticket-holder, so maybe I have a little more ability to offer some candid thoughts about this team. Mr. Dolan, Paul, can I call you Paul? I love this team. I am teaching my four kids to love this team. My spare entertainment dollars go 90% to support this team, and almost all my spare time is spent analyzing and promoting this team. I also have officiated way too many funerals now for big Cleveland baseball fans who died without ever seeing their team win a title. Now, I realize that you have put forth a valiant effort at ending this drought, with Cleveland having the third best winning percentage in MLB since 2013 at .551. If not for the cruel whims of the baseball gods in either 2016 or 2017, the Guardians may have finally got that no-chips monkey off their backs. I get that. But, Paul, this is the time, now is the moment, to try to break the curse of Rocky Colavito. And you and your family can erase every negative connotation connected to your name by giving a valiant effort at doing it in these next two seasons.

Let’s look back at the 2024 season... entering the year, it was clear that the Guardians had three primary areas of concern: starting pitching, right field and one relief arm. I wrote about that before the winter meetings in December 2023, so this isn’t hindsight speaking. I repeatedly emphasized that the team should not expect Shane Bieber or Triston McKenzie to be healthy for 2024 after both suffered elbow injuries in 2023. Bieber blew out his elbow in April and McKenzie, for whatever reasons, was simply ineffective. And, the Guardians made a shrewd move of adding Ben Lively as a back-of-the-rotation arm and a brilliant move of adding Matthew Boyd midseason. They traded for Scott Barlow, who didn’t pan out, but the concept was fine, and young arms like Cade Smith and Hunter Gaddis stepped up, anyway. And, right-field... well, it was Ramon Laureano, Will Brennan, an aggressive promotion of Jhonkensy Noel, Daniel Schneemann, occasionally David Fry until his elbow blew out, International League MVP Johnathan Rodriguez for a minute, and... well, that’s about it considering that Lane Thomas moved to center when the various Tyler Freeman and Angel Martinez attempts did not work there. Right field was again a bottom 10 in MLB production spot. The starting rotation was bottom 10 also. And, the team still made it to the American League Championship Series.

I would love to know, Paul, what your thoughts were as you watched the Yankees get defeated by the Dodgers in the World Series. Their defensive and baserunning flaws were on full display. The fact that they had only three good hitters (two great) was very clear. The weakness of their best bullpen arms (which also showed up in the series against Cleveland) came back to bite them. This was an eminently beatable Yankees team in a weak American League, so I wonder if you are considering whether or not a few aggressive moves could have got your team a pennant and a chance at a World Series title.

Let’s explore a few what if’s. What if you’d given the green light to be as aggressive as possible in acquiring the best hitter in baseball this offseason and done everything possible to beat the Yankees offer for Juan Soto from the Padres? We can’t say for sure that the Padres would have preferred whatever package the Guardians could put together, but I can say for sure that there were zero reports the Guardians were particularly engaged there, and there are significant doubts you would have been willing to take on Juan Soto’s $31 million one year deal or agreed that trading four-five valuable, cheap talent assets for Soto was a good idea.

But what if you’d won a World Series with the third best production in MLB in right field in 2024 instead of the 20th best production? What if?

I’m going to give you the latitude to say that the offseason movement in starting pitching was fine. You gave yourself a chance to see how things would pan out. However, midseason it was very clear that you would have to get more starting pitching to have a chance to win a title. Brilliant move acquiring Matthew Boyd. No notes. The other move was for Alex Cobb. I understand the concept - good pitcher who gets tons of groundballs. But, injuries wrecking his attempt to help the Guardians was not at all unexpected given his hip, finger, and related problems throughout the season. What if, instead of acquiring the Giants’ pitcher you got, you had given the green light to the team to add the $20 million plus it would have taken to acquire Blake Snell for the remainder of the 2025 season? Giants beat reporters during and after the deadline said that Snell was available if a team was willing to take on his money AND give a good prospect return for him, so that $20-25 million would have also required the Guardians to surrender some valuable, cheap talent to get the 1.72 FIP, 13.57/3.56 K/BB% Snell put up in the second half of 2024 instead of what Cobb gave them in the playoffs? And that’s a lot of money, I get it.

But what if you’d won a World Series by adding one of the best pitchers in all of MLB instead of Alex Cobb? What if?

What happened, happened. What’s done is done. But, Paul, you’ve still got the youngest team in baseball, coming off an ALCS appearance, with a young manager and coaching staff who have proven they can hang with the best. Please understand: this is the 2016-2017 offseason. This is the same circumstance in which you approved adding Edwin Encarnacion in the biggest free agent deal you’d ever given out and Boone Logan in an attempt to flesh out a good bullpen. It’s time to add the pieces needed to strengthen the Guardians rotation and give yourself a chance at above-average production in right field. It’s time. Because you are not going to have a better shot at ending the World Series drought than the one right in front of you. Sure, another good oppportunity might present itself... maybe it’ll even happen sooner rather than later. But, you have the pieces and parts to do it now in an American League that, currently, will have no clear favorite in 2024. There will never be a BETTER time to invest a little bit more to put yourself and your family firmly in the place of being beloved and revered by Cleveland fans.

This team should sign a Matthew Boyd-type. Definitely. But, they should also be doing all they can to trade for or sign a guy who is more clearly a #2 starter. Just look how much more likely a Snell-Bibee-Williams-Boyd-Cantillo rotation is to make a World Series run than a Bibee-Williams-Boyd-Cantillo-Lively rotation. Look how much better your depth of Doug Nikhazy, Ryan Webb, Triston McKenzie, Austin Peterson and even Daniel Espino looks when you add TWO big pieces to that starting rotation? You go from “Yeah, they can definitely win the Central again if things go well” to “The Clear Division Favorites and World Series Contender.” And all it will likely take is a measly $125 million over the next three years... when your major league asset is going to net you multiple billions when you sell it (fairly soon).

And, hey, you’ve got a top 10 farm system in MLB. If your front office has the green light, they can land another bat for right field (Taylor Ward, Lars Nootbaar, Mike Yasztrzemski, Jesus Sanchez, Seth Brown...) and give bats like Chase DeLauter and Juan Brito (whichever are left after said deal) a chance to continue to develop and provide depth instead of relying on them to be healthy and ready enough to make a significant impact while you’re trying to win a World Series. Yes, giving up cheap talent hurts the longterm financial picture... but counterpoint... what if you win a World Series?

When Cleveland signed Edwin Encarnacion and Boone Logan in the winter of 2016-2017, it was not a sign that there longterm approach to free agency was changing. No one that I know took it that way. It was a sign that you, Paul, and your team recognized the opportunity in front of you, and the team proceeded to be the best Guardians team I have ever seen (1995 being the only competitor) and set a MLB record for longest winning streak. Baseball baseballed and they didn’t win it all. But, you gave yourself a legitimate chance to win a World Series. You also had a roster good enough to do it in 2018.

The same chance is before you for 2025-2026. You’ve got a superstar, future Hall of Famer who loves this team and city to lead the way in Jose Ramirez. You’ve got young controllable stars in all kinds of spots. You just finished drafting from the number one spot in MLB and replenishing an already good minor league system with even more talent. THIS is the time to extend yourself just a little bit, push payroll into more of the $130-140 million territory for just 2-3 years and see if you can get this thing across the finish line. For your family, for the city, for the fanbase, for your pride.

Do I expect anything like this to happen? No. No, I do not. I expect uncertainty over broadcast rights finances to circumvent any significant financial investment. If the team can sign a Matthew Boyd-type and add like a Max Kepler, I’ll consider that a win because of my lowered expectations. But, it’s not going to change the perception of the Dolans as a cheap ownership group and it’s going to leave this team with the task of beating some long odds to end this drought instead of leveraging the fact that you’re about to sell this franchise in the fairly near future and recoup any temporary defecits to spend a little more and lessen those odds. And, there is no better way for the new owner, David Blitzer, to take over than as part of an ownership group that brought this team to the Promised Land.

With the best attendance numbers since 2018 last year, with improvements to the stadium finished, coming off six home playoff games, and with a deep market for starting pitching available in free agency, with the Browns set to rebuild for the 100th time and to leave the city for the suburbs, the time is now, man. The time is now.

Ok, there, I’ve said what I need to say. I’m not going to harp on and on about this all season. Lord, grant me the serenity to change the things I can change and accept the things I cannot, etc. But, let it be known - the time is now and the cost should not be a hindrance. Be a legend, Paul.