The Cleveland Guardians are in a tough spot in the American League Championship Series due to careless mistakes.
On Tuesday night, rookie shortstop Brayan Rocchio and right fielder Will Brennan made errors that let the New York Yankees score runs, leading to a 6-3 victory and giving the Yankees a 2-0 lead in the best-of-seven series.
This is the Guardians’ sixth ALCS, and it’s the first time they are down by two games as the series heads to Cleveland for Game 3 on Thursday night after a day off.
Rocchio, who had 12 errors in 462 chances during the regular season, dropped a pop-up hit by star player Aaron Judge in the first inning, allowing New York to score its first run.
With runners on second and third, Rocchio moved to the right side of the infield and missed the catch as the ball bounced off his glove, which let Gleyber Torres score and put Cleveland in an early disadvantage.
“Obviously I wasn’t able to catch it,” Rocchio said through a translator. “No excuse, I need to make that play, but I think I was in position the best way because I thought I was under the ball and (at the) last minute I was leaning towards second base.”
Cleveland manager Stephen Vogt believed it was a difficult play.
“That ball was up in the air for quite a while with the wind, tough play,” Vogt said. “Those things happen.”
Brennan, who made a sliding catch in foul territory against Giancarlo Stanton for the second out of the first inning, struggled to handle a double by Anthony Rizzo in the sixth inning after Cleveland had narrowed the gap to 3-2 just before.
Rizzo’s line drive bounced off the low wall and deflected to Brennan, hitting his hand and allowing Anthony Volpe to score from first base, increasing New York’s lead to 4-2.
“I just kind of sped up knowing that Volpe can run a little bit,” Brennan said. “Just kind of misplayed it a little bit some. Something I don’t normally do and it just happened to happen in that situation.”
Brennan played 80 of his 98 games in right field and had two errors in 132 chances during the regular season, totaling two errors in 161 chances.
The errors by Rocchio and Brennan came after Cleveland had only one error in its first six postseason games.
“We didn’t play Cleveland baseball today,” left fielder Steven Kwan said. “We got a couple of errors. Obviously we pride ourselves on our defense. So if we want to win some games, we’re going to have to play Guard ball.”
The Guardians made 87 errors during the regular season and were tied with Tampa Bay for ninth place in the American League for errors.
