NEW YORK, NY - SEPTEMBER 26: Jacob deGrom #48 of the New York Mets salutes the fans after the 3-0 win over the Atlanta Braves on September 26,2018 at Citi Field in the Flushing neighborhood of the Queens borough of New York City. (Photo by Elsa/Getty Images)
Jacob deGrom’s teammates and manager, not to mention Mets fans, have realized for months he’s in the midst of a transcendental season, one that demands appreciation even as it unfolds in real time.
On Wednesday night, in the final act of what should end up as the most remarkable Cy Young-winning campaign of all-time, deGrom managed to turn even his opponents into awe-struck witnesses.
“Tonight was — I don’t know, I just want to watch the game on TV later,” Braves catcher Tyler Flowers said after deGrom all but cemented the Cy Young by tossing eight innings of two-hit ball in the Mets’ 3-0 victory. “I know I didn’t get anything to hit, I know that. I think most of the other guys would say the same thing.”
DeGrom finished with 10 strikeouts, three of which came at Flowers’ expense. He retired the final 20 batters he faced while dropping his ERA to 1.70, the third-lowest mark over a non-strike season since the mound was lowered in 1969.
"I don't think I've seen anything like it, so I don't think I can really describe it well or compare it to anything I've ever seen or probably anything that's happened, probably, in a long time," Mets manager Mickey Callaway said.
The start was the 29th in a row in which deGrom allowed three runs or fewer, the longest single-season streak ever. He also set a record by finishing the year with 23 straight quality starts.
“I don’t know that I’ve ever seen him bad — that guy’s so good,” Braves manager Brian Snitker said. “You hate to face him, but then again, you really like facing him because you really appreciate somebody as good at his craft as that guy is What he does to you, you sit there and just hope you can grind out something, get something going. It’s almost like you hope you can just play to a 0-0 tie ’til he’s done.”
Teams actually doing something close to that, with an assist from a sputtering Mets offense that stalled out whenever deGrom took the mound, is how deGrom finished 10-10 instead of flirting with what has been unthinkable for decades — a 30-win season.
As impressive as deGrom’s statistics are — in addition to his microscopic ERA, he finished with 269 strikeouts and a WHIP of 0.91 in 217 innings — the most remarkable thing about his season is how he dominated despite almost constantly pitching with almost no margin for error.
Of the 3,102 pitches deGrom threw this season, 2,438 were fired with the score within one run — including all 110 pitches he threw Wednesday, when the Mets expanded their 1-0 lead on homers by Michael Conforto and Dominic Smith in the eighth inning.
The Mets scored a total of 86 runs while deGrom was on the mound in his 32 starts, including only 56 runs in his final 26 games. They scored two runs or fewer for him 18 times in that span.
DeGrom had five starts in which he went eight innings, allowed three runs or fewer and didn’t get the win. Only three other pitchers had five starts in which they tossed eight innings and allowed three runs or fewer, and the trio of Corey Kluber, Max Scherzer and Kevin Gausman are 13-2 in those 17 games.
“It seems like every game’s the same — he goes out there and he dominates the same way with the same stuff,” Callaway said Wednesday afternoon. “When you’re looking back over the length of all those games, that’s what’s impressive to me. For somebody to do this, and not just be good or in the Cy Young talk but to be one of the best pitchers ever in one season, that’s what’s impressive to me.”
The Mets fell under .500 for good on June 1, which rendered deGrom’s starts the lone compelling element of a lost season.
“I think what Jacob’s done this year, and where our team is at — when he pitches, he deserves a majority of the focus,” Callaway said. “He deserves all the attention he’s getting at this point.”
The Mets were determined to relish his final outing Wednesday, and so were the 23,205 people who showed up on a night in which tickets were available at StubHub for as little as six bucks.
But those in attendance generated enough noise to make Citi Field seem full and create one of the few memorable, buzz-worthy nights the stadium has hosted since the 2015 World Series. The crowd roared at two-strike counts in the first inning and greeted deGrom with standing ovations prior to his final two at-bats. And deGrom was serenaded with chants of “M-V-P” in the eighth, when he punctuated his season by striking out the final batter he faced, Ozzie Albies, for the 1,000th strikeout of his career.
DeGrom offered a rare smile as he walked off the mound to another ovation. The teammates trailing behind him clapped into their gloves.
“What he’s done this year hasn’t gone unnoticed from anybody in this organization,” Todd Frazier said before the game. “He’s so dominant. I’ll get to tell my kids ‘Hey, I played behind maybe a Hall of Famer,’ the way he’s been pitching.
“I savored all of (his starts), to be honest with you.”
The division-winning Braves, too, were transfixed. Told it seemed from up in the press box that deGrom was lifting his game to another level with a chance to lock up the Cy Young, one player said “It seemed like that from down here, too.”
Added the player about the Cy Young: “It’ll be a shame if he doesn’t win it.”
DeGrom will have to wait until mid-November to find out if he’s rewritten how starting pitchers are judged in the balloting. No starter has ever won the Cy Young with fewer than 13 victories. But even given how well Scherzer (18-7 with a 2.53 ERA, 300 strikeouts and a 0.91 WHIP) and Aaron Nola (16-6 with a 2.45 ERA, 216 strikeouts and a 0.98 WHIP) pitched this season, it is growing harder and harder to believe that even the stodgiest of old-fashioned voters will choose one of them over deGrom.
“You’re going to have to ask who votes but I feel like — I wish I had more wins, but it is what it is,” deGrom said. “I feel like I put myself in a pretty good position.”
DeGrom, as he has since he arrived as an anonymous rookie in 2014, was reluctant to reflect on his performance.
“I wish we were in a different position,” deGrom said. “But I’m very happy with how I threw the ball and I think over the next couple of days it will probably set in.”
But the wide grin deGrom sported during postgame interviews, and the sight of him standing in full uniform with family and friends outside the Mets’ family room more than half an hour after the game, indicated he was finally doing doing what those around him have been doing for months: Appreciating an all-time great season.
“I think if he finishes the way he’s been doing it, this is going to be the best season ever, in my mind, with the caliber of play and how hard it is to pitch these days,” Callaway said before the game. “So I’m definitely going to sit back and enjoy watching the best pitcher on the planet tonight.”
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