Guardians vs. Yankees ALCS preview: Key matchup, how each team wins and series prediction

And then there were four. Through two rounds of the 2024 MLB postseason, the New York Yankees and Cleveland Guardians have emerged from the American League field. The AL’s No. 1 and No. 2 seed will now compete for a World Series berth in the ALCS.

With Aaron Judge, Juan Soto and Giancarlo Stanton hosting José Ramírez, Steven Kwan and the best bullpen in the league, it’s sure to be can’t-miss baseball beginning with Game 1 on Monday in New York.

Let’s break it down.

NO. 2 CLEVELAND GUARDIANS vs. No. 1 NEW YORK YANKEES

How they got here

Guardians: Not only did the Guardians win a suddenly ultra-competitive AL Central by a fairly comfortable margin, but they also won enough games to secure the No. 2 seed and a first-round bye straight to the ALDS, thanks in large part to another tremendous season from face of the franchise José Ramírez and a dominant bullpen headlined by closer Emmanuel Clase.

A rare Clase clunker in Game 2 of the ALDS against the red-hot Tigers put Cleveland in a precarious position as the series shifted to Detroit, with the Guardians then facing elimination after getting shut out in Game 3. But a timely go-ahead homer from David Fry in Game 4 and a memorable grand slam from Lane Thomas off Tarik Skubal in Game 5 propelled Cleveland to the ALCS for the first time since 2016.

Yankees: The Yankees bounced back from their dismal 2023 campaign in a big way with their 21st AL East crown and the best record in the American League, marking the first time since 2012 that New York entered October as the No. 1 seed. Aaron Judge and Juan Soto lived up to the hype as one of the more dynamic offensive duos the game has seen in years, and the pitching staff finished the regular season in the top 10 in MLB in both rotation and bullpen ERA.

While production beyond Judge and Soto has been disjointed if not downright discouraging at times in this postseason, we’ve seen tremendous stretches from the likes of rookie Austin Wells, trade acquisition Jazz Chisholm Jr. and super slugger Giancarlo Stanton that have demonstrated the explosive potential of this lineup. Stanton added to his stellar October résumé with a big series against Kansas City, helping the Yankees advance past the Royals in four games.

Key matchup

How significant is Cleveland’s bullpen advantage?

The Guardians arrived in October with one obvious superpower compared to the rest of the playoff field: a bullpen that ranked at or near the top of every statistical category imaginable. As expected, Cleveland leaned heavily on its relief corps to advance past Detroit — to the point that some of its best arms suffered the rare slip-up along the way. That said, just because Clase allowed nearly as many earned runs in the ALDS (4) as he did in the entire regular season (5) doesn’t mean the Yankees are going to be thrilled to see him emerge from the bullpen.

It also won’t be a walk in the park in the late innings leading up to Clase, especially if Cleveland seizes an early lead. Considering he appeared in all five games of the ALDS vs. Detroit, Cade Smith’s elite fastball has finally been introduced to the national audience — and in spectacular fashion, as the rookie right-hander struck out 12 of the 22 batters he faced. Hunter Gaddis also had his moments, as did Eli Morgan, Tim Herrin and Erik Sabrowski. This is certainly not a one-man show featuring Clase in the ninth; manager Stephen Vogt will lean on a bunch of these guys for high-leverage outs over the course of the series.

But given how well New York’s primary bullpen trio of Luke Weaver, Clay Holmes and Tommy Kahnle threw in the previous round and for much of the second half of the season, it’s possible that the Yankees have the personnel to match zeroes with Cleveland’s ‘pen in the later stages of games. With a deeper and more formidable stable of starting pitchers, New York shouldn’t need to ask quite as much of their relievers, so it’ll be more about delivering when their names are called than carrying the load for entire games, as Cleveland’s relievers have.

So far, the Yankees’ bullpen has done exactly that, combining to allow zero earned runs against the Royals in the ALDS. This matchup might still read advantage Cleveland for now, but the gap certainly appears smaller than you might’ve expected a few months ago.

How they win

Guardians: Vogt has said all season that his team wins with its bullpen, and that is unlikely to change now. But Cleveland also enters this series with a notable edge on the basepaths as well as on defense. The Guardians stole 60 more bases than the Yankees during the regular season and were significantly better at taking the extra base when opportunities arose. While they might not be able to keep up with New York in the slugging department, the Guardians could close the gap in run production with timely and aggressive baserunning and standout defense across the diamond capable of thwarting potential Yankees rallies.

It’s also crucial to note that these Guardians aren’t quite the small-ball merchants we’ve seen in recent years. After ranking 29th in home runs in 2022 and 30th in 2023, Cleveland’s 185 long balls in the regular season were tied for 12th in the league in 2024. There’s more pop in this lineup now, and Yankee Stadium is a much more homer-friendly ballpark than Comerica Park or even Progressive Field, so it wouldn’t be shocking to see the Guardians launch some well-timed dingers in the Bronx to help them steal a game or two on the road.

Yankees: Although hitters not named Stanton were fairly quiet against Kansas City, the ceiling for this Yankees offense remains significantly higher than that of the opponent. What the Yanks lack in speed on the bases they make up for by simply being on base all the time and punishing opposing pitchers with gargantuan home runs, as no team drew more walks or hit more dingers than New York in the regular season.

But while New York flexing its slugging and on-base advantage on offense would be the most straightforward way to overwhelm the Guardians, there is also a path to victory via run prevention. Cleveland’s offense is quite tough to strike out and boasts more over-the-fence power than in recent years, but these Guardians still do not reach base at an especially high clip, and as shown by their 20 consecutive scoreless frames vs. Detroit, their bats are liable to go ice-cold for extended stretches. If New York’s stellar pitching staff can exploit the Guardians’ proclivity to chase pitches out of the zone and keep their best bats quiet, the Yankees should be in decent shape in this best-of-seven, in which there is more time for sheer talent to win out than in a more condensed series.

Series prediction

Yankees in seven

We’ve seen these teams face off in October several times over the years, most recently in the 2022 ALDS, in which the Yankees came back from down 2-1 to defeat Cleveland in five games. A fair number of names on both rosters remain from that series, albeit primarily on the position-player side, with the most notable new characters being Thomas and Tanner Bibee for Cleveland and Soto and Carlos Rodon for New York.

The Yankees won both series against the Guardians during the regular season, taking two of three in Cleveland in April and two of three in the Bronx in mid-August. Both Cleveland victories came in extra innings, and the Yankees’ run differential was plus-15 across those six contests. The Guardians are certainly capable of pulling off the upset here, but the star power and superior starting pitching give New York the edge in what should be a terrific series.