JAKE deGREAT DOES IT AGAIN!
DeGrom strikes out 15 in two-hit gem, also has two hits and an RBI
Jacob deGrom gives the Mets everything they need. And then he gives them some more.
The Mets came home to Citi Field on Friday trying to snap a three-game losing streak, and hoping deGrom could set them on a better path.
After catching the red eye back to the Big Apple from the Windy City, the Mets started their first series against the Nationals this season still struggling to score runs. And with deGrom on the mound, runs never seem to come easy for the Amazin’s.
But baseball’s best pitcher not only delivered on the mound, he also came through with the biggest hit of the night, further enhancing his reputation as an all-around star.
DeGrom drove in the Mets’ first run of the night and finished with two hits. Oh, and he also struck out 15 – his third straight game with at least 14 Ks – in the Mets’ 6-0 win over Washington in front of a limited but amped-up crowd in Queens. DeGrom threw a complete game, and it was the second shutout of his career.
“I try to control what I can control and take it one pitch at a time,” deGrom said after the game. “Walking in I was a little nervous, but just executing pitches I thought felt good and try to keep us in the ballgame.”
Mets bats were basically useless against the Nationals’ Erick Fedde over four innings. It wasn’t until the Mets ace broke it open in the fifth with an RBI double off Fedde that the Amazin’s found some kind of flow. Before the game, Luis Rojas said he merely expected length, and a chance to spare some arms in the bullpen, from deGrom. What they got Friday was so much more.
“What we’re witnessing is something special,” the Mets skipper said after.
DeGrom gave up two hits, and he has fanned a remarkable 50 batters over his first four starts of the season.
By the middle of the game, fans empathically chanted “M-V-P,” every time deGrom was even at the plate and those cheers continued well through the game as deGrom not only retired the final 19 Nationals batters, but contributed two hits, two runs and an RBI in four at bats.
“He single-handedly won and changed the game,” Brandon Nimmo said.
Fortunately for deGrom, the rest of the Mets bats got the message.
Two more runs came across for the Mets courtesy of Brandon Nimmo in the fifth, who was back in the lineup after missing two games with a stiff hip. Nimmo, in the fifth, got deGrom and Jeff McNeil (reached on a walk) home on a single to right field. As if Nimmo had all this pent up power and energy waiting to explode, his bat never silenced again all game.
Dominic Smith helped the Mets increase their lead by one more in the seventh. After Nimmo reached on a double that came just short of clearing the center field wall, Smith’s single to left field drove Nimmo in.
That big hit previewed what was to come an inning later, when Nimmo homered close to
the Coca Cola corner, a shot that also scored deGrom.
“Jake is unbelieveable,” Nimmo continued. “He has to not be from this planet because he does things that are out of this world.”
That analysis of deGrom isn’t unique. Ask anyone who’s ever watched or listened to deGrom play on either side of the plate, anyone would tell you he’s way more than a competitor.
Catcher James McCann told Steve Gelbs that deGrom wasn’t about just winning, but about stealing your soul. To which deGrom said “it’s part of competing. Those guys are trying to beat me, I’m trying to beat them.
“I’ll leave it at that.”