CLEVELAND — One game separated the Guardians and White Sox in the regular-season standings, and that’s exactly how close they were head-to-head. That figures to make for a nip-and-tuck playoff series in which one mistake could turn the tide.
“I think there’s been four walk-offs,” Sox outfielder/designated hitter Randal Grichuk said Saturday before Game 1 of the American League Division Series (noon, TBS, truTV, 1000-AM). “And every game I feel like has been tight.
“We know every pitch, at-bat is going to matter. Every base, run is going to matter. So taking care of the baseball on defense and playing next-man-up mentality offensively is going to be huge for us.”
The Sox won the season series 7-6, giving them the tiebreaker should they have caught the Guardians for first place in the AL Central. But after losing two of three to the Guardians in mid-September, the Sox fell one game back after an 11-8 loss to the Tigers on Sept. 18 in which they blew a six-run lead. They never were in first place again.
The Sox outscored the Guardians 58-57 in the season series, with seven of the 13 games decided by one run. Four games were decided by two or three runs, and one was decided by four. The only blowout was an 8-2 Guardians victory.
“It really has been crazy kind of the back and forth that we’ve had all year,” Sox manager Will Venable said Friday. “We’re excited about the opportunity to play these guys, but we know full well how challenging it is to beat them. They’re going to take advantage of every mistake that we make, whether that’s walks, giving them extra bases.”
The teams know each other so well that there probably isn’t anything either can do to surprise the other. This isn’t football, where a trick play can make a difference.
“It’s about executing game plans,” Venable said. “I think at this point, there’s not some big adjustment in game plan that we have up our sleeve that we can throw at them. It’s about the guys executing, probably as much as any matchup that we’ve had where, as far as strategically, we know what we want to do on our side, they know what they want to do on their side.”