Bieber making music on the mound for Indians
OAKLAND – Now that he has claimed a regular spot in Cleveland’s rotation, Shane Bieber knows he’ll get to make his third home start next Monday.
He just doesn’t know which walk-up song will greet him. Teammates Corey Kluber and Trevor Bauer played a prank on the rookie right-hander before his last start June 22 at Progressive Field, getting his usual entrance song, a reggae tune by the band Rebelution, switched to something more in line with his famous last name.
“I heard the young Justin Bieber song; I think it was ‘Baby,’ ” Bieber said. “I looked around, and Frankie (Lindor) was messing around on the mound, kind of singing along. I looked at him and said, ‘Did you do this?’ And he goes, ‘No.’ Then I ended up getting out of the first inning, came back in and all the pitchers were laughing.”
Bieber finds it easy to laugh at the frequent references to the pop icon, but he’s serious about his pitching craft. Called up twice from the minors to make spot starts on May 31 and June 17, Bieber made enough of an impression that he kept getting the ball, and his performances continued to improve. After yielding five runs over 111⁄ in
3 nings in his first two outings, both against the Twins, Bieber shut down the Tigers and Cardinals in his next two starts, giving up a total of one run in 13 innings. For the season, he’s 3-0 with a
2.22 ERA, and the Indians have won all four of his starts. On Sunday they demoted Adam Plutko, making Bieber the fifth starter.
During his time with Cleveland, Bieber has continued to display the uncanny command that has been his hallmark during a swift rise from fourth-round pick in 2016 to a member of the rotation with the third-best ERA in the majors this season. Bieber’s four bases on balls in 241⁄ innings and excellent walk per
3 centage of 3.9 pale in comparison to his astonishing numbers in the minors. At Class A and AA last season, he gave up
10 free passes in 1731⁄ innings, or one for
3 every two complete games. He was nearly as stingy at Class AA and AAA this year, with six walks (and 72 strikeouts) in 762⁄ innings while fashioning a
3
1.29 ERA. Armed with a fastball that averages 93 mph and is complemented by effective secondary pitches in a slider and a curve, Bieber became convinced early he was better flooding the zone with strikes than nibbling against major league hitters and risk putting them on base.
“It’s going out there and having the competitive mind-set that if you’re going to beat me, you’re going to beat me. I’m not going to beat myself,” said Bieber, who turned 23 on May 31, the day of his debut. “If I’m going to get beat, I’m going to get beat throwing something in the zone and my best pitch. It makes it easier to cope with if things don’t end up going well, which happens in this game.”
As a lowly recruited pitcher whose fastball did not impress scouts, Bieber took that approach to UC-Santa Barba- ra, where he was invited to walk on but had no guarantee of making the team, let alone getting a scholarship.
He wound up becoming the top starter of a club that reached the 2016 College World Series, a first in school history, and concluded his college career with a
23-12 record, a 2.73 ERA and a 6.2-1 strikeouts-to-walk ratio.
Through training and refining his mechanics, the 6-3, 195-pound Bieber has increased his fastball velocity to a shade above major league average, which is reflected in his strikeout rates of 8.4 per nine innings in the minors and
10 per nine so far in the big leagues. But it’s the feel for pitching he developed in his younger days — manager Terry Francona says he’s “in the mold of Kluber” — that has made Bieber an instant success, kind of like that fellow who shares his last name.
“I was a little bit of a late bloomer, so I had to learn how to pitch, learn how to manipulate the zone and pitch with multiple pitches,” Bieber said. “I definitely think that factors in.”