Sports
The ALCS isn’t over. But the Guardians tried everything to even it up — and still came up short
NEW YORK — If it feels like this American League Championship Series might already be over, well, that’s unfair to both the Cleveland Guardians and to history. But the Guardians and their manager, Stephen Vogt, approached the second game on Tuesday with the urgency and aggressiveness worthy of the stage — and still looked unfit to share it with the New York Yankees, who took a 6-3 victory and a two-games-to-none series lead.
Make no mistake: the Guardians deserve to be here. They won 92 games this season, just two fewer than the Yankees and part of a vastly underappreciated stretch of success. Did you know that in the last dozen seasons, only the Yankees and the Los Angeles Dodgers have more victories than Cleveland? And those teams, you may have heard, spend a bit more money.
But if the Guardians can’t win a game like this, they must be asking themselves, deep down, when they will ever break through.
Consider:
— They got on base in nine of their last 15 plate appearances against the Yankees’ ace, Gerrit Cole. The barrage of singles and walks chased Cole in the fifth inning, but produced just two runs.
— The Yankees stumbled into two outs on the bases in the sixth — “That’s what they do,” John Sterling noted on radio, “run the bases like drunks!” — yet still scored a run on a bobble by Guardians right fielder Will Brennan. It was the second Cleveland error, after shortstop Brayan Rocchio fumbled a pop up to score a run in the first.
— The Guardians used their best starter, Tanner Bibee, and all of their best relievers had two days of rest. But the Yankees managed six runs while rapping 11 hits, five for extra bases, and Cleveland still hasn’t found a lead for its star closer, Emmanuel Clase, to protect.
— José Ramírez, the Guardians’ centerpiece third baseman, lashed a homer to pierce the Yankees’ suddenly untouchable closer, Luke Weaver. But it was poor timing for Ramírez’s first hit of the series; he’d previously left five runners on base.
José Ramírez blasts a solo shot in the 9th #ALCS pic.twitter.com/PHtk76QPUT
— MLB (@MLB) October 16, 2024
“We didn’t play Cleveland baseball today,” left fielder Steven Kwan said. “We had a couple of errors. We obviously pride ourselves on our defense. So if we want to win some games, we’re gonna have to play Guard Ball.”
By that, Kwan said, he meant “fundamental baseball: make the plays that we’re supposed to, hit with runners in scoring position, get the guy over. Just fundamental stuff to be able to play the game.”
It’s lazy to say that the moment looked too big for the Guardians, who have baseball’s youngest roster for the fourth year in a row, according to general manager Mike Chernoff. This is a team that lost its ace, Shane Bieber, to injury after two starts; lost its division lead in August and rallied to finish 17-10; and lost two of its first three playoff games to Detroit but recovered with two stirring comebacks.
“I feel like all year we’ve kind of really done this,” Bibee said. “I feel like at the beginning of the year, in a lot of people’s eyes, we weren’t supposed to be here. But we’ve always known that we were supposed to be here. And we still think that. So that doesn’t change just because we’re down two games. There’s a reason it’s a seven-game series.”
It is, but credit Vogt — a rookie manager — for approaching Tuesday with a must-win mentality. He went to his limited bench in the second inning of Game 3 in Detroit, and it didn’t work then. But that didn’t stop Vogt from gambling again this time, using David Fry to hit for Bo Naylor with the bases loaded in the fourth.
Fry popped out on the first pitch, and because an elbow injury keeps Fry from catching, Austin Hedges had to replace Naylor. Naturally, when the Guardians loaded the bases again in the fifth, it was Hedges — a defensive stalwart but historically poor hitter — who struck out to end the inning.
“It was the highest leverage moment of the game, bases loaded, one out,” Vogt said, explaining the decision to use Fry in the fourth. “We want to take a shot with David. Gerrit Cole, really good pitcher, made a good pitch on David and got the pop up. Austin’s been a big part of our team. We wanted to take our shot right there. We felt that was our biggest opportunity at that point. You don’t know when you’re going to get three guys on against somebody like Gerrit Cole.
“It’s who we are. We take chances when we do. It’s just unfortunate we were not able to come through with a big hit.”
That’s postseason baseball: be who you are, but bolder. It’s the same reason that Vogt intentionally walked Juan Soto to load the bases for Aaron Judge with one out in the second inning — then took out Bibee after 11 batters, the fewest he’s ever faced in his 59 career starts.
The Guardians have the majors’ best bullpen — and you cannot lose without deploying your greatest strength. So Cade Smith took over for Bibee, held Judge to a sacrifice fly and retired all five hitters he faced.
“We haven’t gone to the ‘pen as early as we did tonight, but the stakes being higher, basically at that point we’re trying to stop the game and stop their momentum,” pitching coach Carl Willis said. “You can’t let the game get away from you. You just can’t. Because if you do, there’s no need for Cade later. And while you may flip the script and all of a sudden you’re like, ‘Oh hell, we used Cade in the fourth’ — but still, we have trust in the other guys, and you have to get to that point. You can’t just bank on getting there.”
Vogt’s predecessor in Cleveland, Terry Francona, has a philosophy about managerial moves: “If I can’t explain this,” he has said, “it’s wrong.” In other words, if a manager has an option that gives the team a better chance to win, there’s really no choice. Take it.
The Fry move backfired. The Soto and Smith moves basically worked. In any case, the Guardians won’t win this series by being passive. Vogt understands that.
And as bleak as things seem for Cleveland, it’s looked this hopeless for other teams, too. Just last October, the Philadelphia Phillies easily won the first two games of the NLCS at home against the sixth-seeded Arizona Diamondbacks. But when the series shifted to Arizona, the Diamondbacks adjusted their pitching strategy, quickly evened the series and won it in seven.
Willis, a reliever for the 1991 Minnesota Twins, has been there, too. In that year’s classic World Series, the Twins took the first two at home but then lost all three in Atlanta before recovering to take the crown.
“We’re going home, and we have one of the best records in the major leagues at home,” Willis said. “It can turn on a dime, and they know that, too.”
It can — and for the Guardians, it must.
(Top photo of Tanner Bibee exiting Game 2 of the ALCS: Dustin Satloff/MLB Photos via Getty Images)
The Lakers are one playoff defeat from their season being over and from the conversation turning to LeBron James’ future.
They are in a hole no team has climbed out of in the history of the NBA, the Lakers’ 131-108 loss to the Oklahoma City Thunder in Game 3 putting L.A. down 3-0 in the best-of-seven Western Conference semifinal series.
James and his teammates gave a gallant effort Saturday night at Crypto.com Arena, but the defending champion proved to be more than the Lakers could handle.
James finished his night with 19 points on seven-for-19 shooting, eight assists and six rebounds. Rui Hachimura had 21 points and Austin Reaves finished with 17 points and nine assists.
Even so, the Lakers have now lost all three games by double digits.
And the Lakers are fully aware that no NBA team has successfully come back from a 3-0 deficit in the playoffs, with those teams holding a 161-0 record. Only four teams have forced a Game 7 after trailing 3-0, all of which ultimately lost the series, including the Boston Celtics in 2023.
Lakers forward LeBron James shows frustration as Thunder center Chet Holmgren slam dunks during Game 3 on Saturday night.
(Robert Gauthier / Los Angeles Times)
Game 4 is Monday night, when the Lakers will try to stave off elimination and a night that will determine how the conversations go with James if they lose.
James has been frequently asked this season about retirement, but he has not given any indication of what the future holds for him.
He’s 41 years old and playing in an NBA-record 23rd season.
James is in the final year of his contract that pays him $52 million, making him a free agent this offseason. He can retire, join another team or perhaps return to the Lakers next season.
That will be the conversation if the Lakers can’t win Game 4.
They will see the same Thunder team that had seven players score in double figures, led by Ajay Mitchell’s 24 points and 10 assists and Shai Gilgeous-Alexander’s 23 points and nine assists.
The Lakers went down 13 in the third quarter and had to play catchup the rest of the way. They never did, going down by 112-94 with 6 minutes and 12 seconds left, forcing Lakers coach JJ Redick to call a timeout.
The deficit just kept growing, topping out at 27 points in the fourth.
They were outscored 33-20 in the third quarter. The Lakers didn’t take care of the basketball in the third, turning it over six times, and they didn’t play good defense, allowing the Thunder to shoot 59.1% from the field and 55.6 percent from three-point range,
The Lakers did not give an inch to the Thunder in the first half, even when they fell behind by 10 points.
They just kept grinding until they led 59-57 at halftime.
Hachimura had 16 points in the first half, continuing his hot three-point shooting by making all four of his threes. Luke Kennard came off the bench to give the Lakers 13 points, shooting five for six from the field and three for four from three-point range.
The Lakers kept the pressure defense on Gilgeous-Alexander. Though he had 14 points in the first half, he shot only four for 14 from the field and one for five from three-point range.
The Lakers shot 55% from three-point range in the first half, which went a long way in helping them.
The Lakers lost the first two games by identical margins of 18 points and each loss was magnified because Gilgeous-Alexander was kept under wraps for the most part by L.A.’s defense.
When Gilgeous-Alexander picked up his fourth foul with 10:34 left in the third quarter of Game 2 and went to the bench, the Thunder turned a five-point lead into a 13-point advantage at the end of the quarter.
So, when he wasn’t on the court, the Lakers failed to take advantage.
“Well, you know, again, I’ll repeat what I said after the game: we’ve got to be better in the non-Shai minutes,” Lakers coach JJ Redick said.
Role players like Mitchell and Jared McCain hurt the Lakers in the second game. Chet Holmgren also was hard to deal with.
“Mitchell and McCain have hurt us in those non-Shai minutes, and then Chet [Holmgren] has hurt us the whole game,” Redick said. “I think you’ve got to be willing to live with something. Shai playing one-on-one, thus far in the series, we haven’t been willing to live with, so you’re going to be in rotation. That can lead to smalls on bigs at the hole, and the offensive rebounding from Chet has really hurt us.”
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In 2025, Alex Palou kicked off the Month of May with a Sonsio Grand Prix win at the Indianapolis Motor Speedway road course.
Based on the odds, it’s likely that Palou will find himself in Winner’s Circle again this Saturday when INDYCAR goes back to IMS on May 9 (4:30 p.m. ET, FOX).
Considering Palou has already captured the checkered flag three times this season, are there any other drivers whose odds are worth a wager?
Here are the latest lines at DraftKings Sportsbook as of May 9.
This page may contain affiliate links to legal sports betting partners. If you sign up or place a wager, FOX Sports may be compensated. Read more about Sports Betting on FOX Sports.
Sonsio Grand Prix 2026
Àlex Palou: 5/18 (bet $10 to win $12.78 total)
Kyle Kirkwood: 5/1 (bet $10 to win $60 total)
Pato O’Ward: 12/1 (bet $10 to win $130 total)
David Malukas: 14/1 (bet $10 to win $150 total)
Josef Newgarden: 16/1 (bet $10 to win $170 total)
Scott McLaughlin: 20/1 (bet $10 to win $210 total)
Christian Lundgaard: 30/1 (bet $10 to win $310 total)
Scott Dixon: 40/1 (bet $10 to win $410 total)
Will Power: 60/1 (bet $10 to win $610 total)
Felix Rosenqvist: 80/1 (bet $10 to win $810 total)
Alexander Rossi: 100/1 (bet $10 to win $1,010 total)
Marcus Ericsson: 100/1 (bet $10 to win $1,010 total)
Marcus Armstrong: 100/1 (bet $10 to win $1,010 total)
Christian Rasmussen: 150/1 (bet $10 to win $1,510 total)
Graham Rahal: 150/1 (bet $10 to win $1,510 total)
Louis Foster: 300/1 (bet $10 to win $3,010 total)
Dennis Hauger: 500/1 (bet $10 to win $5,010 total)
Romain Grosjean: 500/1 (bet $10 to win $5,010 total)
Santino Ferrucci: 500/1 (bet $10 to win $5,010 total)
Rinus Veekay: 500/1 (bet $10 to win $5,010 total)
Kyffin Simpson: 500/1 (bet $10 to win $5,010 total)
Caio Collet: 1000/1 (bet $10 to win $10,010 total)
Sting Ray Robb: 1000/1 (bet $10 to win $10,010 total)
Nolan Siegel: 1000/1 (bet $10 to win $10,010 total)
Mick Schumacher: 1000/1 (bet $10 to win $10,010 total)
Here’s what to know about the oddsboard:
Heavy Favorite: It doesn’t look like Alex Palou’s dominance will be slowing down anytime soon. As noted above, he’s already won three of the five races since the INDYCAR season started in March. With 186 laps led, Palou sits first in the standings and has the shortest odds to win the title again. Last season, he started from the pole and led 29 laps before winning the race.
Long Shot to Watch: While his odds of 150/1 to win at IMS are much longer than Palou’s, Graham Rahal is one to watch. At this race in 2025, he started second and led 49 laps before finishing sixth. He finished second at this course in 2015, 2020 and 2023. He’s currently 10th in the INDYCAR standings, with one top five and three top 10s.
Sports
Prep talk: Southern Section Division 1 semifinals features matchup of boys’ volleyball powers
Get ready for the best high school boys’ volleyball action in the nation on Saturday when four powers face off in the Southern Section Division 1 semifinals.
First up is Huntington Beach hosting No. 1-seeded Mira Costa at 1 p.m. Then it’s Loyola hosting Redondo Union at 5 p.m.
All are capable of beating each other.
Teams are finally healthy, so there could be two five-game matches.
Mira Costa remains the team to beat with a 31-2 record and having the No. 1 college recruit from the class of 2027, Mateo Fuerbringer. Redondo Union owns one of those losses. Loyola is healthier than it’s ever been and has a five-game win over Redondo Union and a five-game loss to Mira Costa. Huntington Beach has two three-game losses to Mira Costa.
The championship match will be next weekend at Cerritos College, followed by the Southern California regional and state championships.
This is a daily look at the positive happenings in high school sports. To submit any news, please email eric.sondheimer@latimes.com.
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