Manager Terry Francona and the Guardians are pulling off the unimaginable

And down the stretch they come! Fasten your seatbelt. This is it. Starting today, 21 games in 22 days to finish what would be, if they can pull this thing off, one of the greatest team feats in Cleveland sports history. Hyperbole? I think not. Think about this: The Cleveland Guardians, with 21 games left in the regular season, are in first place in the American League Central Division, three games ahead of Chicago and five games ahead of Minnesota. Wednesday, the Guardians threw a matinee haymaker at the Los Angeles Angels as Jose Ramirez broke a 3-all tie by clubbing a two-run home run in the eighth inning, lifting the youngest team in the major leagues to a 5-3 victory, extending their winning streak to six games. This is crunch time and the baby Guardians are the crunchers, not the crunchees. Most important of all: They're playing their best when it means the most. They've won six in a row and eight of their last nine. "They're competing, that's what I care about," said scoutmaster Terry Francona. "Playing the game right, running the bases right. I don't care how old they are. I just want them to play the game the right way, and they're doing a good job of that." Just ask the Angels, who left with dirty faces after getting swept in the three-game series by a cumulative score of 13-8. The finish line is within sight, and the Guardians are in the driver's seat. They seemingly have no business being there, but there they are. Before we pause to marvel how this team is this close to achieving a feat that six months ago would have seemed to be the height of preposterousness, let us count the ways which suggest there's no way any of this should be happening. Let's start with the usual perceived warts. The Guardians have the fourth-lowest payroll in the entire sport. With gaping holes on their roster last winter, they did absolutely nothing to improve it. Indeed, with three weeks left in the regular season, the Guardians, among all AL teams: Have hit the second-fewest home runs, have scored the fifth-fewest runs, have the sixth-fewest RBIs, the fourth-fewest walks, the fourth-lowest slugging percentage, fifth-lowest OPS, and fifth-fewest total bases. The following pitchers have combined to start 21 games for Cleveland this year: Konnor Pilkington, Brian Shaw, Kirk McCarty, Eli Morgan, Cody Morris, Xzavion Curry and Hunter Gaddis. Let's also not forget Yohan Ramirez, Tanner Tully, Anthony Gose, Ernie Clement, Alex Young, Anthony Castro, Sandy Leon, Logan Allen, and Ian Gibaut, who combined to pitch 53 innings this season — and Clement and Leon aren't even pitchers! Meanwhile, Aaron Civale and Zach Plesac, who were a combined 22-11 last year, are a combined 5-17 this year — and both are injured. Talk about making it up as you go along. Francona has had to — so he has. Every year, it seems, Francona is a candidate for Manager of the Year. He's gotten votes for the award in 11 of his 22 years as a big-league manager. He's won it twice, both with the Guardians — in 2013 and 2016. Considering the above evidence, if they win the AL Central this year, they should just name the division after the Guardians' manager. Regardless of how it all plays out, this has been one of the most remarkable performances by a manager and his team in recent memory. The Franconamen are like the cute, little undernourished dog on the street corner. When passerbys try to pet it, they leave with teeth marks on their hand. In Cleveland's 3-1 win over the Angels on Tuesday night, seven of the nine innings were pitched by Morris and McCarty, neither of whom had thrown a pitch in a major league game prior to this season. The two greenhorns held future Hall of Famers Mike Trout and Shohei Ohtani to a combined 0-for-6. It's been that kind of season. A season in which the inexplicable has become the explicable, if not the believable. Nobody saw this coming from the youngest team in the major leagues. Maybe their youth has been a blessing. Maybe they are too young to realize that they shouldn't be capable of doing the kind of things they are doing. What they are doing is consistently outplaying — not out-talenting, but outplaying — their older opponents. Final exams begin today. Starting today, the Guardians will play nine consecutive games against the White Sox and Twins. Six of the nine will be at Progressive Field. After losing eight games in a nightmarish 10-game offensive drought against Seattle and Baltimore to start the month, the baby Guardians are back on their feet. The next challenge: Winning the majority of the nine steel-cage matches with Minnesota and Chicago. Six months ago, nobody could have dreamt this of Cleveland's kiddie clubbers, but the division is there for the taking. Contact Jim Ingraham at jingraham4@gmail.com.