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Corey Kluber certainly isn't broken

Corey Kluber tied a franchise record by striking out 18 batters in 8 innings last night.

Ken Blaze-USA TODAY Sports

It's been coming up a lot around the Beyond the Box Score office lately, whether or not the Klubot is broken. In fact, a couple of our articles lately even made direct mention of his extremely high BABIP. Debate no more, as Kluber absolutely dominated the St. Louis Cardinals last night, a team whose K% — even after yesterday's game — is the 8th best in the league. Even their hard contact rate is 7th in the league. Suffice it to say, Kluber didn't pull this off against the 2014 Padres.

When Corey Kluber took the mound last night, he was 0-5 with a 5.04 ERA. However, upon closer inspection, Kluber had been generating groundballs at a more-than-decent clip and had a very respectable 3.19 FIP. It wasn't a matter of waiting for Kluber to return to his Cy Young form then, it was a matter of the Cy Young-caliber pitcher actually getting fair representation from his statistics. What's the best way to combat a high BABIP? Take a no-hitter into the 7th inning and strike out 18. Last night, Kluber did just that.

Enough talk, it's gif time.

Kolten Wong? He gone.

Jason Heyward? He gone too. Special mention to Kluber's sleeve fix as he exits the mound. *swoon*

A curveball good enough for Heyward? It's gotta get Mark Reynolds too. That's three total and the first of his 3 strikeout third inning.

That Matt Carpenter guy though, he makes a lot of contact, he's sure to break the no-hi... He gone.

You probably get the point... But what's one more and a personal favourite:

Jhonny Peralta waves at the breaking ball and then looks up at Kluber like he's murdering kittens. Amazing.

. . .

All statistics courtesy of FanGraphs and Baseball Prospectus

Michael Bradburn is a Featured Writer for Beyond the Box Score. You can follow him on Twitter at @mwbii. You can also reach him at michaelwbii@gmail.com