One of the best relievers the game has to offer could be heading to Queens.
Are the Guardians going to buy or sell on July 31 this year?
Typically, that's a question that is easy to answer for most teams, but for Cleveland in 2025, it could really go either way.
The team currently sits second place in the American League Central but sit a hefty nine games behind the dominant Detroit Tigers, currently right at .500.
And one player in particular has been heavily involved in trade rumors for the team, regardless of what the team decides to do, and that one player is the Guardians flamethrowing closer, Emmanuel Clase.
And according to The Athletic's Jim Bowden, a new trade rumor is pitting a swap that would send Clase to the New York Mets, where he would stand alongside another intimidating closer in Edwin Diaz, so determining who would be the closer and who would be the setup man would be a brain-racking decision for Mets manager Carlos Mendoza to make.
But in the end, he'd have two of the best closers in the game on his squad, so would it really be that pressing?
Clase, who finished third in the AL Cy Young Award voting last season, the highest finish for a relief pitcher since 2008, got off to a rough start in the 2025 season, quickly allowing the same number earned runs in a month than he allowed in all of 2024 last year, but has since bounced back to post a 2.86 earned run average while recording 44 strikeouts in just as many innings.
Nowhere near his numbers from his incredible 2024 campaign, where he posted a jaw-dropping 0.61 ERA, but just enough to make him as dangerous as a closer comes.
Category: Baseball
