News reports have announced that ace starting pitcher Shane Bieber has decided to re-sign with our Cleveland Guardians. The deal was announced on Friday and is a one-year deal worth $10 million with a player option that would pay $16 million for a second year. In the event that Bieber declines the player option after the 2025 season, he would be paid a $4 million buyout and hit the open market that subsequent winter.
The signing is a victory for a Guardians team looking to sure up a starting rotation that was hampered by injury (including Bieber, but we will get to that in a minute) and ineffectiveness from much of its talent in 2024. Given the context around the signing, it is an even bigger victory because Bieber returning to Cleveland, for any period of time, at this time last season would have seemed impossible.
Last winter, the Guardians found themselves in a conundrum. At that point in time, if they looked 12 months into the rear-view mirror, they would have seen themselves winning 92 games as the youngest team in baseball, more than exceeding expectations and making the playoffs. Bringing back mostly the same squad in 2023 seemed like a recipe for even bigger and better things given an additional year of experience under everyone’s belt. Instead, the team underachieved, losing more games than it won. At the end of the year, future Hall of Fame manager Terry Francona would leave, bringing even more unpredictability to Cleveland’s future success.
So, this time last year, a strong 2024 season was far from a certainty. With Bieber approaching free agency as a bona fide ace, there was little doubt that he would garner a massive payday on the open market. With the team’s immediate success in question, it could have made a lot of sense to seize this as an opportunity to trade Bieber and reload with new talent. Instead, the Guards stuck to their guns.
Shane Bieber would pitch on Opening Day for Cleveland. He would pitch again for his next scheduled start in Seattle five games later. Combined, he would put together a masterful 12 scoreless innings. He would allow just 10 hits and one walk while striking out 20 batters. He would be worth 0.7 Wins Above Replacement in just two starts, putting him on pace for 10.5 WAR for the season. Mind you, five whole pitching staffs didn’t accumulate 10.5 over the course of the entirety of the 2024 season. That’s how good he was.
And then he just wasn’t. Bieber had been fighting right elbow inflammation dating back to the previous season, and on April 6th, four days after pitching six scoreless vs. the Mariners, it was announced he would need Tommy John surgery.
My meltdown is documented on this website (let’s be fair, I wasn’t alone). Even with a successful West Coast road trip to start the campaign, the season felt over. Additionally, the gamble to keep Bieber in the fold – the gamble to keep a highly successful ace in the starting rotation in hopes of turning fortunes – seemed like a bust. The Guardians risked it. They went for it. They held onto talent in hopes of immediate success. And for their effort, they would get 12 innings and nothing else. No additional ace-level innings. No prospects in a trade.
If you haven’t figured it out by now, baseball is unpredictable.
And it was again for Cleveland last season. Despite only getting those two starts from their staff ace, the Guardians went 92-69, won the American League Central Division and took the Yankees to five games in the American League Championship Series. As this season went along, comments would be made by fans regarding Bieber’s status. These would include hopeful optimism that perhaps Cleveland could convince him to return for another season, considering that despite the Guardians’ inability to keep up financially with many other teams on the open market, Bieber’s price tag would be diminished by his injury status and the fact his 2025 season would be truncated by his recovery.
For many, that seemed very wishful. Even without being able to pitch at the start of the season, pitchers of Bieber’s caliber are incredibly hard to come by. Lucas Giolito, who had been a former ace with the Chicago White Sox but had struggled in recent seasons to the point of leading all of baseball in home runs allowed in 2023, signed a contract that paid him $19 million in 2024 because of his potential and despite his more recent struggles. Bieber is also a California native, with plenty of ball clubs based out of the state that are more flush with cash than the Guardians, he could have easily returned to his roots and found comfort closer to home while continuing to rehab and ultimately making his return.
To my point, injury wouldn’t keep other teams from scooping Bieber away. And yet, it has… kinda. It was also reported on Friday that Bieber had higher offers on the table, but instead chose to remain in Cleveland despite those larger paydays.
In retrospect, there is some sense in this from Bieber’s perspective. He will be able to return to Cleveland, the only professional baseball home he has ever known. He will be able to continue to rehab with the same trainers and staff that he is already acclimated with. There is a major sense of familiarity there, but also, a sense of competency as Cleveland has built one of the most highly regarded pitching development programs in all of baseball. Truthfully, his best shot at returning as his best self is probably in Cleveland.
I personally also don’t think it is a coincidence that the two most talented Cleveland baseball players in recent memory have both been willing to take less money in order to stay with the organization. Bieber’s situation is certainly not one and the same as Jose Ramirez‘s, but I still think it should resonate that very talented ballplayers that play in Cleveland like playing here enough to take less money. At a minimum, the culture that has been built (that yes, starts with ownership) is incredibly healthy. While that doesn’t add an extra $100 million to the coffers to spend on high-priced free agents, it does make a difference in terms of wins and losses over the course of a 162-game season.
Bieber is tentatively scheduled to return to the mound mid-season. So the Guardians are essentially paying Bieber at least $10 million to pitch for about half the year. For comparison, San Diego will pay two pitchers not as good as Bieber historically- Joe Musgrove and Yu Darvish – $20 million for a full season.
Of course, goodwill can ultimately only get you so far. If Bieber’s rehab is successful and he does indeed come back as a better player, it is a near certainty that he will then hit the market and depart the Guardians roster. On the off-chance that he suffers a setback, has an even longer delay to his return, or just ends up being very ineffective, he will likely opt in, collect his $16 million in 2026 and the Guardians will give it one more crack to get an ace-level year from one of their longest-tenured players.
Bieber’s entire career, while highly successful when healthy, has also been wracked with uncertainty. From his ascension from fifth starter to staff ace all within the 2019 season, to multiple injuries, to this latest saga. At this point, I don’t feel right about comfortably trying to determine what 2025 holds.
However, if (and it is a very big “if”) Bieber is indeed feeling right, it could be exactly what the Guardians need. When Matthew Boyd entered the fold this summer, he provided a much-needed boost to a starting rotation that was being run by Tanner Bibee, Ben Lively, and not much else. With Bieber being an even better caliber of starter to add this summer, this could be like the Matthew Boyd addition on steroids (also, perhaps the Guardians were even able to use the success they found with Boyd as part of their pitch to Bieber). This goes without mentioning Bieber’s ability to pitch deep into ballgames and a short, but existing, track record of pitching at a high level in the post-season.
Let’s assume that Bieber is back and pitching at that high level to go along with Bibee, who made great strides during 2024 as a starting pitcher who can be leaned on. If either Lively can come back prepared to pitch a starter’s workload for a full season, or one of Gavin Williams, Joey Cantillo, Triston McKenzie or Logan Allen can reach their potential, then the Guardians could have one of the best three-man starting rotations, to go along with the best bullpen in October.
And I know that seems a little bit like grasping at straws, but there is some legitimate talent within those names. Williams had a season not interrupted by injury and McKenzie returning to a form he has shown in the past are both legitimate paths to a strong, three-headed monster in the starting rotation.
Given everything else I’ve said, I recognize that these are uncertainties. But that didn’t stop the Guardians last year. They believed in Shane Bieber, and they went for it. Given the same chance in 2025, they’re going to do what we’ve all been asking them to do. They’re going to try to win now. They’re going for it.
The post Run It Back! Breaking Down Shane Bieber’s Return To The Guardians appeared first on Cleveland Sports Talk.