The Cleveland Guardians have long been renowned for their development of pitchers—and now their staff has another ace up its sleeve.

Former pitcher Corey Kluber is joining the Guardians as a special assistant, the team announced Wednesday morning. Kluber, 39, has been out of baseball since a year with the Boston Red Sox in 2023.

The move reunites Cleveland with its best pitcher of the 2010s, whose stoic presence on the mound galvanized its success in the middle part of the decade.

Virtually out of nowhere in 2014, Kluber went 18-9 with 269 strikeouts, a 2.44 ERA, and an MLB-best 8.1 bWAR. He won the American League Cy Young award, and eventually won it again for a 100-win Cleveland team in 2017.

The franchise traded Kluber to the Texas Rangers before the 2020 season, and he bounced around four teams before calling it a career.

The Guardians are currently 25-17—second in the American League Central Divison and 2.5 games behind the first-place Detroit Tigers.

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This article was originally published on www.si.com as Guardians Hire Franchise Legend As New Pitching Special Assistant.

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