FINALLY, JAKE GETS A VICTORY
HARD-LUCK METS PITCHER WINS CY YOUNG — SEE SPORTS
Jacob deGrom got it done.
There are no more questions about wins, run support and the team's success.
DeGrom was simply the best pitcher in the National League in 2018 and was officially announced as the NL Cy Young Award winner in a landslide Wednesday night.
The 30-year old righthander received 29 out of 30 first place votes to beat out Nationals ace Max Scherzer, a three-time Cy Young winner, and Phillies ace Aaron Nola.
John Maffei was the only voter not to pick deGrom, instead going with Scherzer. The San Diego Union Tribune writer had deGrom second, followed by Miles Mokolas and then Nola.
DeGrom got it done in an nontraditional way, where voting members of the Baseball Writers of America Association overlooked the traditional metrics in which a starter's success is valued and dug deeper. Now, the Mets will likely have to dig deeper into their pockets if they want to extend the best player they have had over the last four years.
DeGrom, who becomes a free agent after the 2020 season, said Wednesday night he is open to extension talks, but has not yet been approached by the Mets.
“This is the only team I have ever played for. I really enjoyed my time with the Mets. they've been nothing but good to me,” deGrom said. “The fans have been great to me, like I said it's pretty much just keep open the communication and continue to keep it that way and continue to have a good relationship with them, either way this thing goes.”
Even though adding the Cy Young to his resume will likely kick up the cost a few million dollars, the Mets need to reward deGrom for his dominance not just in 2018, but for being their best pitcher over the last four years.
They need to get an extension done.
DeGrom has the fewest wins by a starter to ever win the Cy Young. The hard-luck loser managed to scrape together 10 wins this season despite abysmal defense and a lineup that was brutally bad particularly when deGrom was on the mound. Felix Hernandez with 13 wins was the American League Cy Young winner in 2010, then the lowest win total for a starting pitcher ever.
Even deGrom wasn't certain he would be able to overcome the fact that the Mets won just 14 of the 32 games he started this season.
“You don't know what really is being looked at. For me, and I said it before, you do want to win baseball games and it's important the team wins, but you want to have wins for yourself as well. Any time you can put your team in position you feel like that's a win. My record didn't really show that,” deGrom said on a conference call Wednesday night. “That's something that's kind of out of your control as well as how it's looked at with the voting. You don't really know what's taken into consideration.”
“It's kind of out of my control, it's what people value that a Cy Young Award winner should accomplish.”
DeGrom knew that his remarkably miniscule ERA was his best case for the Cy Young against Scherzer, who led the NL with 18 wins, 300 strikeouts and 220.2 innings pitched.
DeGrom led the majors in ERA (1.70), WAR (8.8) and tied for first in the NL in WHIP (0.91) with Scherzer. His numbers were historic .He is only the 11th pitcher in the last 100 years to pitch to a 1.70 ERA or lower in a season. He is the only pitcher in MLB history to post a 2.00 ERA with over 200 strikeouts (269), 50 or fewer walks (46) and 10 or fewer home runs
(10). In his last 29 starts, deGrom allowed three runs less, a major league record.
What may have been most indicative at how effective deGrom was at preventing runs this season was how he counteracted the rising power in the game. He allowed a career-high 28 home runs in 2017 and gave up just 10 last year.
That was obviously what voters were looking for and he becomes the fourth Met to win the Cy Young. He joins three-time winner Tom Seaver (1969, 1973 and 1975), Dwight Gooden (1985) and R.A. Dickey (2012) as Mets who were honored with the award.
Amonth after Dickey won his Cy Young, the Mets turned around and traded him for Noah Syndergaard and Travis d'Arnaud. The Mets need to make a similar franchise-defining move now too. It's time for the Mets to dig a little deeper in their pockets and find whatever get an extension with deGrom done this winter.
Blake Snell of the Tampa Bay Rays was named the AL Cy Young winner during his full first season in the majors.