A new baseball stat: The deGrom
Carlos Carrasco inspires a new metric, and the Mets get set to face the defending National League West champion Giants
It’s hard to complain about the Mets winning two out of three in their first home series of the season, but dang if they shouldn’t have swept the sorry Diamondabcks, especially the way that Saturday’s game went in a 3-2 loss.
Still, the Mets are 7-3, tied for the most wins in the majors and two and a half games ahead of Atlanta and Miami in the National League East after their first three series of the year. Now, the defending West champion Giants come to Queens for a four-game series that should be one of those April series that tells a lot about where these teams stand relative to a year ago.
We’ll look at that a bit today with Colleen Sullivan, and back at the weekend for an interesting bit of statistics with Jesse Spector. Remember, sign up for a free subscription by the end of April, and you’ll get a full month of access to our premium content when the paywall starts in May. All paid subscribers who are signed up by the end of this month will get three free months of Substack, plus, of course, a copy of our ebook when it comes out.
So, sign up now, and don’t forget that the Willets Pen server is on Discord free and open to all, with live chats during games and lots of other channels ready for you to have fun.
Lower Manhattan skyline, photo by Jesse Spector
Trivia question: On April 18, 2002, Al Leiter pitched a two-hit shutout for the Mets at Olympic Stadium in Montreal. Which two batters, sandwhiching Vladimir Guerrero Sr. in the lineup, had the only Expos hits?
Introducing the deGrom
By Jesse Spector
Carlos Carrasco was excellent in his first home start of the season on Saturday afternoon, using his split-changeup to rack up eight strikeouts in five scoreless innings against the Diamondbacks.
Following up a strong first start in Washington, Carrasco’s early-season ERA is at 0.84, with only five hits allowed, 13 strikeouts in 10.2 innings, and only two walks, one intentional. Despite the only run of the season against Carrasco coming on a Nelson Cruz homer in the first inning in D.C., his record is 0-0, and the Mets are 0-2 in his starts.
This isn’t an unfamiliar set of circumstances for Mets fans to observe, but it’s new that it’s Carrasco. Usually, when a Mets pitcher is brilliant, doesn’t get any support, and as a result doesn’t get a “W” for his efforts, it’s Jacob deGrom.
Indeed, this was Carrasco’s first time throwing five scoreless innings and coming away with a no-decision as a Met, and the sixth time it’s happened in his career. Which pitcher, in his major league career, has had the most games throwing five or more scoreless innings, but not recording a decision?
That’s right, it’s Greg Maddux, with 16.
But Maddux did that in 744 career trips to the mound. Next on the list, at 15 of these performances, are Roger Clemens (709 career games), CC Sabathia (561), and Justin Verlander (455).
Cole Hamels did this 14 times in 423 career games, and so too, in only 198 career games, has Jacob deGrom.
In other words, this kind of thing happened in one out of every 46.5 starts for Maddux, or every year and a half or so. For deGrom, it’s every 14.1 starts, more than three times as frequently.
That’s why this stat (happily meeting with the approval of Jason Lukehart, creator of The Maddux, a shutout of nine or more innings on fewer than 100 pitches) is The deGrom. Again, it’s a pretty simply defined feat that nobody really wants – five or more innings of shutout ball, and no decision.
The all-time list?
Career deGrom Leaders
16: Greg Maddux
15: Roger Clemens, CC Sabathia, Justin Verlander
14: Jacob deGrom, Cole Hamels
13: Zack Greinke
12: Matt Cain, Felix Hernandez, Jake Peavy, Jose Quintana, Julio Teheran
11: Madison Bumgarner, Tom Burgmeier, Steve Carlton, Yovani Gallardo, Rick Reuschel, Nolan Ryan, Chris Sale, Max Scherzer, Jarrod Washburn, Chris Young
(active players in bold)
Interestingly, deGrom’s career high for deGroms is three, in 2018 and 2019. The single-season record is six, set by Roger Clemens in 2005 and matched by Clayton Kershaw in 2009. Dustin Hermanson had the 20th century record with five deGroms in 1997, a total also reached by Jeff Samardzija in 2014 between the Cubs and A’s.
The Mets’ team record also doesn’t belong to deGrom for a single season, although obviously he has the organization’s career mark. Orlando Hernandez and Matt Harvey put up four deGroms apiece in 2007 and 2015, respectively.
What deGrom has had is remarkable consistency: at least one deGrom every season since 2014. In fact, from May 1, 2019 through April 5 of last year, all six of the Mets’ deGroms were by deGrom himself. Since then, we’ve seen Joey Lucchesi (in a 1-0 loss to Washington), Tylor Megill (in a 9-7 loss to Pittsburgh), Rich Hill (in a 6-2 win over Washington), and now Carrasco pick up the slack, as it were, for the oft-injured ace.
The Mets’ bats have been rock steady all along, including this weekend. They’re perfectly capable of not hitting in support of a great pitching performance anytime, whether it’s deGrom, Carrasco, or anyone else that they can put in position for another deGrom.
Behind Enemy (Base)Lines: San Francisco Giants
By Colleen Sullivan
Some people like the Giants. I don’t know who those people are, but my guess is they’re local to San Francisco and work at Google.
2021 Giants: 107-55, 1st in NL West
2021 was notable as the first time since 2016 that the Giants clinched a spot in the postseason, winning 107 games with the best record in the majors before going out in the division series against the Dodgers. San Francisco batters led the National League in home runs (241), slugging (.440), OPS (.769), and stolen base percentage (83%). The pitching staff led in the NL with the fewest walks (416) and home runs (151), and tied for the league lead in saves (56). All in all, not too shabby. This was the final season of Buster Posey on the Giants before he retired, as featuring a Kris Bryant cameo after the trade deadline and before he brought his beautiful blue eyes with the Rockies as a free agent.
In addition to proving that PECOTA is bullshit, the 2021 Giants had their best regular-season record in franchise history. Baseball Prospectus’ projection system had the Giants pegged to win 75 games last year, and we can all see how well that went.
Noted weirdo and questionable character Gabe Kapler was (yuck dot gif) named 2021 NL Manager of the Year, and now is in his third year at the helm of the Giants.
2022 Giants: It’s still early
The Giants didn’t make a lot of splashy moves outside of signing Carlos Rodón to a two-year contract. Meanwhile, they declined to exercise the option on RHP Johnny Cueto (now with the White Sox), while exercising the options on Wilmer Flores, José Álvarez, and Jay Jackson. Additionally, they claimed three players off waivers in the form of Hunter Harvey, Austin Dean, and Joe Palumbo, while also keeping much of their core. The addition of Joc Pederson adds a shot to the roster that only Pederson can bring – namely, an interest in crypto.
BadBitchCoin, anyone?
The Giants come to New York having won five straight games, including a three-game sweep in Cleveland where San Francisco allowed only four runs, total, to the Guardians. They’ve also played the Marlins and Padres at home, taking two of three from each, so this week’s four-game series should be a good early test for both teams.
The Giants’ pitching staff has only allowed three home runs this season (we’ll see how that goes against reigning back-to-back Home Run Derby champ and current National League RBI leader Pete Alonso) and have 23 walks with 80 strikeouts. Logan Webb leads their starting rotation followed by Rodón, Anthony DeSclafani, Alex Cobb, and Alex Wood. The strong, experienced rotation and bullpen will make things harder on any offense, and the Mets will see all but Wood this week, with an outstanding series of matchups on tap: Cobb-Tylor Megill, Webb-Max Scherzer, Rodón-Chris Bassitt, and DeSclafani-Carlos Carrasco in Thursday’s matinee.
The Giants have an older team. Fifteen players on the 40-man are 30 or older, which could either provide a base of veteran energy to contend again like last year, or a lot of players on the IL. 2022 projections aren’t great, but that’s familiar to anyone who has seen teams run away with the division (or completely bottom out). So far, though, so good for the Giants on following up their surprising 2021.
Trivia answer: If you remember the final years of the Expos, one of the answers should be pretty easy, as Jose Vidro hit .298/.374/.497 in his career against the Mets. The second baseman’s double in the sixth inning followed a two-bagger a frame earlier by Expos catcher Michael Barrett. It’s one of 20 games in Mets history where their starting pitcher spun a complete game without allowing a single – the last time it happened was Johan Santana’s no-hitter in 2012. David Cone, Gary Gentry, Pedro Martinez, and Tom Seaver are the only Mets pitchers to throw two complete games without giving up a single.
Thanks to everyone who entered our 2022 predictions contest. There were 34 entries, and we’ll look forward to tracking how everyone does as the season goes on. Please remember to tell a friend to check us out if you’re enjoying Willets Pen, and remember that all free subscribers by the end of April get a free month of premium access, while all paid subscribers this month will get 90 extra days on their subscription as a thank you for supporting us from the beginning!
I would've guessed the record for deGroms would be higher than 16. Not that 16 isn't a lot of times to have something like this happen, but I think I would have guessed Jacob himself already had close to 20, and that while he'd surely be approaching the record, he'd have farther to go. It makes sense that so many of the leaders are active or very recent, because pitchers being pulled before giving up any runs only became common pretty recently, but I still would've thought there'd be more old-timers on the list, guys leaving 0-0 games after 8 or 9 innings during eras when scoring was low. Interesting and fun stuff!
For anyone curious, the record for most Madduxes is 13 (by Greg), and no one else has more than 7. It should also be noted that Madduxes only date back to 1988, because that's when MLB began tracking pitch counts. No active player has more than 3, so unless baseball DRAMATICALLY changes course, that record will never fall.