Jacob deGrom and Max Scherzer are healthy; now, can the Mets' pair of aces hold up?
Mets pitchers Jacob deGrom, left, and Max Scherzer. Credit: AP; Jim McIsaac
Hours before Jacob deGrom was scheduled to take the mound Thursday night against the Rockies — on six days rest — it was logical to consider how the Mets may choose to deploy their twin aces over these final 36 games.
They already tipped their hand this week by bouncing deGrom from the back end of the Subway Series in the Bronx to Thursday’s start at Citi Field. Manager Buck Showalter offered a number of reasons for that move -- from prioritizing Taijuan Walker’s arm strength to deGrom’s atypical warmup in Atlanta on Aug. 18 followed by a season-high 95-pitch outing that night.
To experienced deGrom observers, the tiniest blip in his routine or schedule usually sets off sirens. And to hear Showalter start talking about things like “torque” and the physical demands of deGrom’s brilliance sounded awfully familiar tracing back to his troubles of a year ago.
On Thursday, however, deGrom seemed mostly up to speed in the Mets’ 3-1 victory as he fired four perfect innings and retired 13 straight before Jose Iglesias’ infield single in the fifth. Ryan McMahon stung him with a 436-foot homer that almost cleared the visitors’ bullpen and Showalter lifted deGrom after that sixth inning — on just 87 pitches.
The rationale? Showalter said he relied on multiple factors in pulling him there. As for deGrom, he stated his preference for finishing an inning, and that number jeopardized his chance of completing the seventh. No need to push him for for a late August game against the terrible Rockies if Showalter can avoid doing so. Otherwise, deGrom looked fine, though his velocity was slightly down from his season average, with a four-seam fastball clocked at 98.5 mph (compared to 99.5).
As for settling into a “regular” routine going forward, deGrom suggested that remains a work in progress.
“We’ll cross that bridge when we get there,” said deGrom, who struck out nine and is now 3-1 with a 2.15 ERA. “I think they’re checking off all the boxes and it’s leaning in that direction.”
But deGrom isn’t the only one to be monitored closely. Max Scherzer just turned 38, and his playoff run ended last October due to arm fatigue — “overcooked” is how he explained it over the winter. This season, Scherzer missed nearly seven weeks with an oblique strain, so he’s only at 18 starts and 115 2/3 innings.
Curious about what residual effect that could have as far as his shape and stamina — possibly beneficial? — I asked Scherzer about it Thursday afternoon. He wasn’t a fan of that perspective.
“It’s a failure that I got hurt,” Scherzer said. “I don’t want to see any solace in, ‘Oh, you have less innings.’ No. There’s no positives from being hurt.”
So there’s nothing to the saving more bullets theory?
“Even if it’s true, I don’t think that way,” Scherzer said.
Bottom line, the Mets have a pair of multiple Cy Young winners with fairly recent health issues that they need to keep functioning at an elite level. And put aside October for now. Showalter & Co. are in a full-blown division race, now leading relentless Atlanta by two games, and don’t have the luxury of juggling their rotation to preserve deGrom and Scherzer for the playoffs.
The Mets need them both to pitch as much as humanly possible to hold off the defending world champs. The good news is that neither appears to be under any restrictions from those previous ailments. This week’s shift from the high-intensity Subway Series stage to Thursday’s start against the lowly Rockies raised some eyebrows, but if the Mets can give deGrom an extra blow in some spots, he’s going to get it. That careful approach could face some conflicts with the NL East title and first-round bye on the line during these next few weeks.
“If you don’t have a healthier player, then it doesn’t matter — all the other stuff,” Showalter said. “If someone’s got a physical problem, you don’t pitch him. But I’m hoping we get some of the things back that we’ve been cautious about over the season.”
The Mets frequently pumped the brakes for deGrom, whose methodical recovery and rehab stint stretched up to a month longer than the team’s conservative predictions. The reward has been a deGrom that shows flashes of being more dominant than ever. But over the past two years, deGrom has been impacted by 11 different injuries of varying severity — three of them requiring the IL.
Scherzer’s trip to the IL was the sixth of his 15-year career and fourth since 2017. But as far as staying healthy under the added duress of a divisional fight, Scherzer doesn’t plan on stepping off the gas to play it safe. He only knows one gear. And one goal.
“We gotta win — every day,” Scherzer said. “That’s it. Win.”
That’s an easier task for the Mets with their two aces on the mound. The challenge is to keep them there.
David Lennon is an award-winning columnist, a voter for baseball's Hall of Fame and has covered six no-hitters, including two perfect games.
