Cleveland Indians: Corey Kluber’s potential road to Cooperstown
Better late than never
One thing Kluber has working against him is that he was somewhat of a late bloomer. He didn’t become a permanent fixture in the Indians’ starting rotation until he was 27. By that time, similarly aged peers like Clayton Kershaw and Max Scherzer had already been competing in the big leagues for several years.
This isn’t an outright disadvantage for Kluber, but it does stand to limit him in cumulative statistical categories such as strikeouts, innings pitched and wins. It also slightly narrows his window for dominance in comparison to pitchers who have been in the league since their early 20s.
That said, if we are measuring Kluber against guys like Kershaw and Scherzer, his career numbers stack up pretty well. Below are a few noteworthy stats from the careers of all three, provided by Baseball-Reference.com.
- Clayton Kershaw – 2.36 ERA, 1.002 WHIP, 9.9 K/9, 4.18 K/BB
- Max Scherzer – 3.30 ERA, 1.119 WHIP, 10.2 K/9, 4.02 K/BB
- Corey Kluber – 3.13 ERA, 1.086 WHIP, 9.9 K/9, 4.94 K/BB
Kershaw boasts a vastly superior career ERA (he hasn’t had an ERA above 2.91 since 2008), but other than that, all three have pretty similar numbers in some of the most meaningful pitching categories.
To be fair, as far as regular season pitching numbers are concerned, Kershaw is the absolute platinum standard of this generation. But if we are putting together Kluber’s Hall of Fame resume, we have to measure him against the best of his time. Right now, he measures up about as well as could be asked, albeit with fewer years of MLB service.