Guardians home schedule 2024: Top 5 series to attend at Progressive Field

Humphrey Bogart once said, "A hot dog at the ballgame beats roast beef at the Ritz." He was right.

The Guardians will open their Progressive Field schedule for 2024 on April 8, a day that will be accompanied by a total solar eclipse. Opening Day is March 28, but there won't be many fans able to make the trip to Oakland to ring in the new season.

It'll be the first game in Cleveland since the retirement of Terry Francona and the hiring of new manager Stephen Vogt after the former was at the helm for 11 seasons.

Here's a look at the top five home Guardians series to attend this upcoming season.

The full promotional and game schedules can be viewed here.

Guardians open Progressive Field schedule for 2024 with home opener against Chicago White Sox (April 8-10)

The first home series for 2024 is a solid option for a few different reasons — if Mother Nature will cooperate.

The first is that it's difficult to beat Opening Day or a home opener. Both should probably be national holidays, or at least local with the home openers.

Plus, April 8 is the day of the total solar eclipse, which will be in view from Cleveland in the afternoon. The Guardians spent months going back and forth with local officials and NASA to determine the best first pitch time. They finally picked 5:10 p.m. Make sure you bring your eclipse glasses if you're showing up early, as until 4:29 p.m. people will need them to safely view the solar event.

But for those who can't make it April 8, the day after the home opener is often one of the easiest tickets to get, and it's a solid option. Not enough people think about the second or third game after the pomp and circumstance of the opener.

It's also the first matchup of the season between the Guardians and White Sox, who had a pretty theatrical run-in last season when Jose Ramirez and Tim Anderson squared off for a fight near second base. Anderson isn't there anymore, having signed with the Miami Marlins, but after a benches-clearing scuffle died down and then erupted multiple times, there was plenty of bad blood outside of the main event.

Guardians welcome New York Yankees (April 12-14)

The second home series is another marquee matchup with the Yankees coming to town, which means a few "Let's Go Yankees" chants around the ballpark. It'll be the first Cleveland game for Juan Soto as a member of the Yankees after he was acquired by New York in one of the major moves in baseball over the winter.

This one, though, is also somewhat dependent on Mother Nature. But Cleveland fans always love rooting against the Yankees.

Francisco Lindor, New York Mets travel to Cleveland to face Guardians (May 20-22)

This one is pretty simple: Francisco Lindor will be in town.

His trade to the Mets was a monumental turning point for both franchises, with Cleveland needing to retool and New York hoping to be uber aggressive, though it hasn't worked out well for the latter.

It'll also be the return of Pete Alonso, who put on a show during the 2019 Home Run Derby at Progressive Field.

The best weekend at Progressive Field in 2024 for giveaways and promotions is the June Toronto Blue Jays series (June 21-23)

This series is all about the promotional giveaways and scheduled events.

The June 21 game will feature a free T-shirt for the first 10,000 fans, it's a Sugardale Dollar Dog Night (if you're not trying to set a personal record, you're doing it wrong), it's a fireworks night, it'll feature $2 Pregame in the District and the night will include a Pride Celebration presented by Nestle.

The next day will feature a Josh Naylor bobblehead for the first 15,000 fans, another $2 Pregame in the District promotion and then, after the game, a DIESEL/Shaquille O'Neal concert as a DJ.

It might be the best stretch of extras for fans during the entire season.

Guardians and Minnesota Twins series in September could be Cleveland's ticket to American League Central (September 16-19)

OK, back to baseball-centric reasoning.

If the Guardians can remain in contention for the American League Central crown, this four-game series with the Minnesota Twins could be absolutely crucial. The Twins are betting favorites to win the division, with the Guardians among the second tier of teams hoping to re-take the Central.

If they're still in it, that four game series will likely represent a massively important stretch so close to the end of the season.

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Ryan Lewis can be reached at rlewis1@gannett.com. Read more about the Guardians at www.beaconjournal.com/sports/cleveland-guardians. Follow him on Threads at @ByRyanLewis.

This article originally appeared on Akron Beacon Journal: Cleveland Guardians schedule top 5 Progressive Field series to attend