The Cleveland Indians have named Corey Kluber their Opening Day starter for the fifth consecutive season.
For most this seemed like a foregone conclusion, but Corey Kluber has been named the Opening Day starter for the Cleveland Indians. This is Kluber’s fifth consecutive Opening Day start, this ties him with Stan Coveleski for the longest such streak. Coveleski accomplished this from 1917-1921. The record for most starts by an Indians pitcher on Opening Day belongs to Bob Feller with seven.
There were some who thought that Trevor Bauer could have gotten the Opening Day nod over Corey Kluber. However it did not come to fruition. An early report cited Bauer as being upset, but that turned out not to be the case. Bauer took to Twitter to dispel the rumor.
Corey Kluber has appeared in 201 games with the Indians, 196 of which have been starts. In eight years Kluber has an 3.09 career ERA with a WHIP of 1.070. During his time in Cleveland Kluber has won the Cy Young Award two times and finished in the top three two other times.
Corey Kluber has a career record of 96-55 and has the most wins out of any of the current group of Indians starters. Second on that list is Carlos Carrasco with 76 wins. Trevor Bauer has 59 wins to his name and Mike Clevinger has 28 of his own. Of course the least amount of wins belongs to Shane Bieber. Bieber made his MLB debut last season and has 11 wins in 20 starts.
The current group of Indians starters are considered to be one of, if not the best rotation in all of baseball. Cleveland will without a doubt count on their starting pitching staff to carry them this season. The Tribe will rely on their rotation to carry them to another division title and hopefully a deep playoff run.
