Shane Bieber
Team Control Years Left: 1
2024 Projected Salary: $12.2MM
Shane Bieber is also a former Cy Young Award winner, a two-time All-Star, and won the pitching triple crown in the 2020 covid-shortened season. Despite it only being a 12-game sample size, Bieber was incredibly impressive in 2020 going 8-1 with a 1.63 ERA while striking out 122 batters in just 77.1 innings pitched.
Bieber is no longer the strikeout pitcher he was a few years ago but over the past two seasons, he has still been an excellent starting pitcher. The past two years saw the end of his double-digit K per nine days but he still finished seventh in Cy Young voting in 2022.
Between 2018 and 2021, Bieber struck out 11.3 batters per nine innings pitched. Since then he has struck out 8.4 per nine. He had 8.9 in 2022 and 7.5 in 2023. Bieber has posted a 3.24 ERA over the past two years combined and walked just 1.9 hitters per nine during that time.
Cleveland has a history of parting ways with big-name starting pitchers one year from free agency. We saw them do it with Corey Kluber, Mike Clevinger, and Carlos Carrasco. If they choose to do it with Bieber, he's only going to run about $12 million next season.