The Cleveland Guardians couldn’t have had a tougher opening week assignment this year. They are facing the current AL West champions and one of the American League’s emerging powerhouses: the Seattle Mariners.
Tanner Bibee, Gavin Williams, and Joey Cantillo have all hopped on the mound for the Guardians with different results. It’s now Slade Cecconi’s turn, and all eyes will be on him because he could potentially change the course of Cleveland’s season with his performance.
Cecconi had a solid, if unspectacular, 2025 campaign in Cleveland, but it was full of positives. First and foremost, the 4.30 ERA represented a vast improvement over the 6.66 mark he had in his last season in the desert.
Secondly, he was able to reach 132 innings pitched and got himself familiar with the workload and routines of a full-time MLB starter. Now that he has an entire season of MLB experience under his belt in a stable role, Cecconi can take a step forward in 2026.
The right-hander introduced a cutter to his repertoire last year in his first season with the Guardians. He only used it 3.1 percent of the time.
Reports indicate that Cecconi will use the cutter more often this year. Basically, he is ditching his slurvy slider and migrating to the new, harder cutter plus a horizontal-breaking sweeper.
The idea is to give himself more weapons to neutralize both lefties and righties this year. It’s part of the Guardians’ focus on improving their own pitchers through player development and coaching.
The cutter was a good pitch for him in spring training, helping him post a 1.62 ERA in 16.2 innings in the Cactus League. He will test out his new secondary pitches against a solid and deep Mariners offense that struggled in the opener, but has shown what it’s capable of doing in the 2025 campaign and the rest of the series vs. the Guardians.
Cecconi might not have the elite fastball to be a future ace, but he can take another step forward in his career and post an ERA under four for the first time in his career if he masters his new cutter and the sweeper.
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