Baseball fans, me included, love hyperbolic statements about the teams and players they love, and even those we “don’t.” On any Spring day, for example say March 15th, every team is loaded with 5-tool players, a rotation of aces several of which could be a potential Cy Young winner, and almost certainly an MVP-caliber player. Such is the way of passionate fans. What this does is soften the edges of the genuine greats by lumping them in with the “supergood” players.
Watching Jacob deGrom right now we can see the staggering difference between the elite of the elite and the rest, even really good players. Start after start we are watching baseball history in the making. You know, the “remember when…” kind of stuff. Earlier this season, deGrom, who has a player option after 2022, noted his desire is to leave a record behind that makes him an inner circle Hall of Famer. I’ve seen some words in different stories that describe deGrom as “suffocating” and “having left this planet.”
The news media is loaded with all kinds of script right now about the remarkable, even unprecedented, season deGrom is currently having. This article adds to that litany, but hopefully with less pure regurgitation of what you know, except for the basics: (1) nine starts into 2021, deGrom has a league leading 0.62 ERA and 624 ERA+, (2) he is averaging > 10 Ks per start, (3) he has a league leading WHIP of 0.569, (4) a 1.02 FIP, and (5) he’s thrown more >100 mph pitches in a row – and in a game – than anyone. With the “captain obvious” stuff behind us now, it is worth digging into some other things about the present historic season we are privileged to be watching.
One of the underappreciated pitching metrics in my perspective is pitches per out (PPO), a topic you can read more about here, pertaining to the pitching staff and with regard to Jerry Koosman’s remarkable Game 2 start in the 1969 World Series. I last looked at deGrom’s PPO metric for the 5-year window of 2015-2019, where he posted a slightly above 5 PPO value – that translates to 15-16 pitches in an inning.
With the crushing reality of pitch counts leading to taking a pitcher out of a game, the lower the PPO, the longer a starter can stay in the game, the fewer innings that need to be managed by the skipper and thrown by beleaguered bullpens. For reference, a PPO of 4.0 is phenomenal, 5.0 is awesome, 6.0 is good, and above 6.0 the alarm bells ring for a starter.
This season deGrom is now posting a PPO of 4.36, dropping his average inning to 12-13 pitches. The fact is that what we are seeing is absolute dominance – but it gets even better. In my analysis of Koosman’s 1969 Game 2, he posted a 3.92 PPO, so this is not unprecedented, but Koosman did this pitching to contact, accumulating only 4 Ks in the game. By contrast, deGrom is posting a PPO a shade over 4 and crushing the will of opponent batters by striking them out, swinging (usually “half swinging”) and just looking. The important recognition is that Ks require pitches, whereas contact minimizes pitches. A three-strikeout inning needs a minimum of 9 pitches, obviously. Pitching to contact at least means a batter is putting the ball in play, but just piling up the Ks inning after inning has to be demoralizing. While deGrom does not lead the MLB in raw Ks, he does lead the league in K/9. His PPO is improving through time while at the same time piling up the Ks.
The PPO metric really matters only in the context of outs pitched per game, which in deGrom’s case from ’15-’19 was 19, or 6 1/3 innings. Even with an injury accompanied by clearly a cautious return to pitching, deGrom is right back to his long-term average of 19 outs per game. Consequently, it looks like there is still unlocked potential as his stamina returns and his pitch counts return to a more normal 100 (he is averaging 72 pitches in the past four games). Can we expect another four outs per game of deGrom going forward? Sign me up for that!
During the coming months, it will not be a surprise to be hearing the name Bob Gibson getting mentioned with every deGrom start and article based on his phenomenal 1968 Cy Young and MVP Awards season. What is driving this comparison is the simply outrageous 1.12 ERA of Gibson and having won both awards. You can have a quick chuckle realizing that even doubling deGrom’s present ERA will only put him a shade behind Gibson, and tripling his present ERA keeps him under 2.00 and in range of Tom Seaver’s best season in 1971 (he finished second in Cy Young Award voting). A lot of words are being spilled about deGrom getting better and defying age, but let’s keep in mind his delayed start as a pitcher, and that Gibson’s record-setting year was in his 8th full season, and similarly at age 32.
In this millennium, we need to look at the accomplishments of Randy Johnson and Pedro Martinez, both of whom are closer to our collective memories. Johnson never posted a sub 2 ERA despite winning five Cy Youn Awards; deGrom is on pace to crush the comparative WHIP and audacious 13.4 K/9 Johnson posted in 2001, one his best seasons in a string of many. Perhaps the more relevant comparison would be with fellow righty Martinez, whose 2000 Cy Young Award-winning season was one for the books. Martinez had a sub-2 ERA, near 300 ERA+, and a 0.737 WHIP. Those kinds of numbers are nearly hard to imagine, and yet deGrom is well on-pace to trounce even those.
When we see deGrom pitch every fifth day, we see what looks like a mortal taking the hill. But we need to really appreciate that deGrom left our world, really, some time ago, and we seem to be watching the same illusion that hitters face from wherever he is in the universe.
I did notice that Jake was getting some outs on one or two pitches early in the game. This spells doom for the opponents, but what else can they do? A lose-lose choice: either run up the pitch count and hope to limit his innings, or be aggressive, hit the first pitches, and hope to walk into something… “hope” is still the prevailing word in both scenarios, and hope doesn’t win baseball games.
Jake makes life fun.
No evidence that Jake cheats with “sticky substances.”
On the other hand, Bauer’s latest start was just OK and his average spin rate on his fastball dropped about 8%, according to The Athletic’s Fabian Ardaya.
Wow, great stuff Chris. If only he were given just average run support over the years… Hoping for no off days in DeGrom’s pitching this year. It could be historic.
Two things from this week just stunned me, one is the K chart from Friday night’s game that shows DeGrom’s swinging strikes and every pitch was out of the zone, and the second was Gary Cohen told us DeGrom has totally ditched the curveball, but one of the radio guys saying that Jeremy Hefner told him in spring training that “DeGrom’s curve is elite” but he just doesn’t need it.
Thanks Gus! I think he’s saving the Uncle Charlie for when he needs it. At this point all he would be doing is exposing it. Can you imagine in the post season, deGrom unleashed an elite curve to the mix of elite pitchs including a 92 mph slider? he did throw one curve in Arizona I think and it was like Phil Rizzuto saying “holy cow!” I took that as a warning sign!!
The all out of the zone K chart was incredible. A guy with pinpoint control is not gonna let 94 middle middle happen, so I guess you swing at anything you have a possible chance at, even if you have no chance!
Imagine run support.
I can recall two instances here in the regular season where Gary Cohen said the pitch Jake just threw was a curve. He should throw it, 5 or so times each game. It can’t possibly be elite when he needs it to be if he never throws it.
Scherzer’s the guy who I always think of racking up strikeouts on pitches that are balls. I saw that graphic but it really needs to come with a warning or caveat or something. In the first inning, the umpire called out Machado on a pitch that clearly looked outside. And the next two times up, Machado weakly swung and struck out on pitches that were in the same spot. Also, the strikeout that ended the 4th inning with the bases loaded was a check swing. It may or may not have been a swinging strike on the check swing. I feel like deGrom got a gift on the call on the check swing. And it was clearly a ball.
Still, that leaves 7 Ks on balls outside the strike zone, which is terrific.
And to think he’s also been the best hitter on our team. Small sample size, I know, but I’d feel more confident in Jake pinch hitting than some of the scrap heap players we’ve had on the bench during this rash of injuries.
One thing missing from Jake’s resume is a no hitter. I think he could get one this year.
The main reason pitchers don’t PH is the slight on those other guys that are not being called on. On baseball teams, every decision is instead of the “other” decision. It’s hard to explain to the professional hitter that he just got passed up for a pitcher.
Meanwhile, I’ve seen Jake, and Thor, and Peterson, and Walker have their share of poor calls on pitches that were strikes. I think the universe owes the Mets’ staff a few.
Jake’s 2 strike slider is downright filthy…it’s so filthy no one under the age of 18 should even be allowed to watch it.
deGrom is so dominant. His PPO is so remarkable especially when considering in k/9. The most dominant pitcher I saw was Sandy Koufax who dominated for 5 years, 1962-1966. Of course, most of the time, I was watching him facing the Mets a with a young boy’s perspective. While watching the other night I realized that deGrom has reached that domination. Chris, a very enjoyable and informative article.
Glad you liked the article Metsense!
Chris, thanks for this article and for the fresh take on deGrom’s performance thus far this year. I’ve nothing to add to all the superlatives except this prediction. DeGrom not only chucks a no-no this year but takes a serious run at Vander Meer’s heretofore untouchable accomplishment.
PS thanks for the l Iink to your Koos piece. I missed that the first time around. He was one of my all-time faves and in the inner circle of my 7 year old love affair with those Mets (along with Seaver, of course, but with Buddy and Tommie.). I think that if also threw from the south side, as you mentioned that you did (do?) I would have put him higher on the pedestal too.
Thanks AB. Glad you liked the Kooz article. That Game 2 was a thing of beauty. 36 at his absolute best.
I remember the night that Koufax was beating the Mets, who had never beaten them, and Joe Christopher reached first base in the 8th with two out. Johnny Stephenson hit a ball in the gap, and I was yelling the whole time for Christopher to score, like a horse coming down the he stretch… which he did. Not sure, but I think they actually beat Sandy that night… probably around ’66. Maybe the same year he no-hit them?