DeGrom looks for his usual electric stuff

ARLINGTON, Texas — Jacob deGrom’s best explanation for his recent slump is “flat” pitches.

The movement on the baseball that helped deGrom win NL Rookie of the Year honors in 2014 before taking him to the All-Star Game with the Mets a year later is missing, leaving the righthander to scour video and add extra bullpen sessions in an attempt to regain his mechanics. DeGrom said he’s flying open too soon on his pitches, creating havoc.

“It’s frustrating, but I’ve been able to go out and pitch that way and you have to make an adjustment,” deGrom said before the Mets faced the Rangers on Wednesday. “You have what you have that day and I’ve done a poor job of that my last two starts, not being able to get outs without having my best stuff, which in the past I was able to do.”

A day earlier deGrom was hammered for eight runs over four innings in the Mets’ 10-8 loss to the Rangers and watched his ERA swell to an unsightly 4.75. The bulk of the damage has come in his last two starts, a stretch in which deGrom has surrendered 15 earned runs over eight innings against the Brewers and Rangers.

So an already underperforming rotation that has included Matt Harvey and Robert Gsellman pitching to 5-plus ERAs this season now has an ace issue as deGrom tries to rebound from maybe the worst slump of his major league career.

“I am not seeing the two-seam [fastball] like normal,” manager Terry Collins said. “His changeup, which I think is an outstanding pitch, he didn’t use it much [Tuesday]. Nights you don’t have your quality stuff you have got to pitch and that means you’ve got to use every weapon you’ve got.”

Even in the gem he threw in Pittsburgh two weeks ago, when he allowed one run over 8 ¹/3 innings, deGrom said his front side was flying open early.

“You look at my misses [Tuesday], they were either to a righty down and away or up-and-in,” deGrom said. “I’m either yanking the ball or it’s sailing on me, so that tells me it’s rotational.”

With Noah Syndergaard lost until late July with a partially torn lat, deGrom is the focal point of the rotation for the first time since his rookie season, but said he isn’t carrying an extra burden when he walks to the mound.

“When it’s my day to go, it’s my day to go, whether Noah is here or not,” deGrom said. “It’s definitely unfortunate that he’s not here, but the day I’m pitching it’s my day to pitch, so I just take the same approach. It’s two bad starts.

“It happens. It’s part of this game. This game is not easy. These are big league hitters and when you make mistakes over the middle of the plate that kind of thing happens, which obviously I have done over my last two starts.”