Shane Bieber is still patiently waiting for his first major league no-hitter
Yahoo Sports National Baseball Writer Hannah Keyser spoke with Cleveland ace pitcher Shane Bieber about winning the 2020 AL Cy Young award, his thoughts on all the no-hitters, and what he missed most about fans in the stands.
Shane Bieber joined Yahoo Sports on behalf of Miller Lite. For the remainder of the 2021 MLB season, Cleveland fans can now take a selfie with their team’s ace through an augmented reality experience from the comfort of their own home. Check out the site at www.millerlite.com/clevelandindians
Video Transcript
HANNAH KEYSAR: I'm joined by reigning AL Cy Young award winner Shane Bieber. Thanks for being here, first of all.
SHANE BIEBER: All right, thanks for having me.
HANNAH KEYSAR: I'm curious, do people treat you differently, either teammates or opposition, now that you're the reigning Cy Young Award winner?
SHANE BIEBER: Maybe a little bit, but I try my best to make sure that nobody does. That's not really who I am or what I want, so within the clubhouse my teammates, we all kind of just have fun with it, and obviously it was an incredible experience last year, and it's something that I'm looking to continue this year, so I'm just trying to keep it rolling.
HANNAH KEYSAR: So I have to assume that you are a fan of good pitching performances you appreciate them, you admire them, do you think there can be too many no-hitters?
SHANE BIEBER: Yeah, I know that's a hot topic right now. I personally don't think so. I'm not going to say that there's too many no-hitters until I throw one. So I'm still hungry to throw one and I'd love to see what's going on right now, and you know what doesn't get talked about. You know there's a lot of 19 run games and offenses have their occasions when they explode as well, so that's just the beauty of baseball.
HANNAH KEYSAR: You threw a no-hitter in the minors if I'm correct, right?
SHANE BIEBER: Yeah kind of, I don't really count it. It was like a rain-shortened no-hitter, so there's a couple asterisks there. I was feeling good. I wish, you know, the weather held off, but we're in Gwinnett, and the weather's not too kind there. So the skies opened up, and started pouring on us, and I wasn't able to finish it.
HANNAH KEYSAR: Do you believe in a no-hitter jinxes? Like if you were throwing one, would you not talk to any of your teammates? What if someone came up to you and they're like. Shane, nice no-hitter you got going?
SHANE BIEBER: I think the rest of the team would let them know for me. But no, I'm not too much of a believer. I think personally, or at least in my experience with that rain-shortened one, I was trying to bring guys towards me on the bench because I'd rather just, you know, get it out of the way. It's something that I think pitchers, you know generally for the most part, you start thinking about, you realize it around the fifth, sixth inning. So that's a full hour and a half, two hours of mental torture if you're just trying to ignore it, so might as well embrace it and have fun with, in my opinion.
HANNAH KEYSAR: What's the closest you've come in the big leagues?
SHANE BIEBER: I threw a one-hitter in Toronto. I ended up finishing it with a complete game shutout. And it wasn't like too close, it was like literally the second that I realized it was going on and I didn't have any hits going into the seventh inning I think I gave off a leadoff double, and then that ended up being that. So the closest I've been is a one-hitter, but that was one of my better outings and I still cherish it.
HANNAH KEYSAR: So tell me about this partnership you have with Miller Lite?
SHANE BIEBER: Basically it's another great way for me to be able to interact with fans. I know with the pandemic and so many challenges, the last few years have been unprecedented to say the least, right? And fan interaction with players has gone down, you know for good reason obviously with protocols and everything going on, but this is an opportunity for me to interact with fans or fans to interact with me. I think it's an awesome idea and an awesome program that we got running here and I'm excited to see all that comes out of it. Super easily accessible, you just got to go to millerlite.com/clevelandindians, so it's just a great opportunity to interact with people around the country and the world.
HANNAH KEYSAR: Yeah, getting back to having fans this year, what's the thing you miss the most? Like going from 2020 to now we got fans back in the stands, what was the thing you're like, oh I forgot about that, I like having them here?
SHANE BIEBER: Just the energy. It was a little bit weird getting back to it with, you know, fans at limited capacity, but feeling just the energy of the crowd, the common roar, and how they kind of all act as one, and the boos, the cheers, everything, I think provides a lot for the home team as well as a visiting team, so there's a lot of certain instances throughout the ball game where they get involved or they have an impact on the game that we kind of missed out on last year.
HANNAH KEYSAR: Thanks for doing this, Shane.
SHANE BIEBER: Perfect, I appreciate it. Thanks for having me.
