Cleveland Guardians' Josh Naylor Putting Up Unreal Stats During MLB-Best Hitting Streak
After winning the American League Central in 2022, it's been a major disappointment to see the Cleveland Guardians under .500 for most of the season.
But because they play in the very mediocre Central, they are still within striking distance.
At 31-36, they are just 3.5 games behind the Minnesota Twins for first place in the division. They've won six of their last 10 games and some of that has been fueled by the recent hot streak of slugger Josh Naylor.
Per ESPN Stats & Info:
With a 5th inning single tonight vs the Padres, Guardians 1B Josh Naylor extended his current hit streak to 13 games, the longest active hit streak in MLB.
Through 3 AB tonight, Naylor - who longest previous hit streak was 7 games - is hitting .480 (24-50) during this span.
His hot streak has been valuable to a Guardians team that is generally light-hitting. Even with Naylor's stretch, the Guardians only had two players in their lineup in Wednesday's loss to the Padres hitting above .271.
Naylor leads the team in hitting at .286 this season. He's added eight home runs, 48 RBI, four stolen bases and a .789 OPS.
The 25-year-old made his major league debut in 2019 with the Padres but landed in Cleveland partway through the pandemic-shortened 2020 season.
He's a career .258 hitter with 44 homers.
The Guardians will take on the Padres again on Thursday at 8:40 p.m. ET.
Rookie Logan Allen (3-2, 3.31 ERA) starts for Cleveland while Ryan Weathers goes for San Diego.
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