The Indians announced after Corey Kluber‘s last rehab start in Akron that the Indians ace would be returning to Cleveland on June 1st after essentially missing an entire month (last pitched on May 2nd) with a sore lower back. There is nothing in the baseball universe that could possibly have helped the Indians any more.
As the offense continues to improve, bullpen remains best in baseball and defense sits around league average, the Indians starting rotation has easily been the team’s most disappointing facet. In addition to Kluber’s injury (and a small one for Carlos Carrasco), Trevor Bauer, Danny Salazar and Josh Tomlin have all struggled greatly. Of these, Bauer has shown some promise of late and Tomlin has completely turned things around. With that being the case, the obvious move was to place Salazar in the bullpen and keep the only other bright spot in the rotation, Mike Clevinger, going every five days.
While some have already started with premature trade speculation, the fact is, Kluber has been the best pitcher in the AL since 2014 and with a 1.69 ERA in the two starts prior to his injury, there’s little reason to expect anything less. The Indians have six quality MLB starting pitchers already, so there’s little reason to add more (and no room since none except Clevinger have options and all would be instantly claimed off waivers). Kluber’s return is really all they need.
However, don’t expect the ace to be ace like from game one. He was great in his rehab appearance, throwing five one hit innings, striking out one and walking none, but there’s a huge leap from AA to the big leagues. If there wasn’t, they may have called up Thomas Pannone to see if he could continue that scoreless streak where it counts. Expect at least one rough start when Kluber returns. It has been a month after all and he made just the one rehab start.
In addition, Kluber isn’t quite going to be pitching every five days and Salazar isn’t quite going to be a full time reliever. With two off days next week, the Indians are giving Kluber some extra time off and avoiding him starting in an NL park (and thus having to hit), by using Salazar for one of the games against Colorado next week. The Indians also have double headers on June 17th and July 1st with few off days in between, meaning at least two more starts for Salazar. In the end, this could equate to a six man rotation with Carrasco going every five days and everyone else getting moved around a bit. Giving Kluber the extra time off seems particularly prudent as back injuries have a tendency to linger.
This may be the best solution to seek out who the Indians five for the rest of the year will be. If Bauer or Tomlin continue to struggle and Salazar returns to form, the roles could be traded. If Clevinger struggles (which he’s shown no signs of), he could be sent to AAA and Salazar could return to the rotation. There are many possibilities and permutations, but in all of the best ones include Kluber being the number one.
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