Jacob DeGrom’s Fastball Reaching New Levels of Dominance This Season

While the New York Mets haven’t qualified for the playoffs since 2016, which is a streak they’re attempting to end this season, they’ve featured one of the top starting pitchers in the majors during that span and he’s continued to improve his craft every single season.

Considered a late-bloomer, pitcher Jacob deGrom didn’t make his major league debut until his age-26 season and still required a little seasoning at the highest level of competition over the next few seasons. But once the 2018 campaign rolled around, the three-time All-Star started coming into his own and has dominated on the mound ever since then.

After capturing consecutive NL Cy Young awards from 2018-2019, deGrom was looking to become the 11th hurler to win the award three different times and just the third player to receive it for the third season in a row. Unfortunately, the 32-year-old couldn’t accomplish this impressive feat as he finished third in Cy Young voting last season.

Despite coming up short in his pursuit for a third-straight NL Cy Young award, the 6′ 4″ hurler still enjoyed another outstanding performance in 2020, where he posted a career-high strikeout rate (38.8%) and a 2.6 fWAR rating through 12 starts, and is now looking to help his team end their current postseason drought in 2021. Luckily for the Mets, their superstar pitcher is already off to a terrific start and has nearly been perfect over his first two starts of the season.

Though deGrom remains winless during his eighth season in the majors, which shouldn’t be a surprise at this point, he’s allowed just one earned run, two walks, eight hits and has struck out 21 batters over 14.0 innings.

In comparison to the rest of the league, the dominating right-hander is currently tied for the highest fWAR rating (0.8), tied for the second-lowest ERA- (17), owns the third-lowest ERA (0.64), the fifth-lowest FIP- (35), is tied for the fifth-highest strikeout rate (42.9%) and has also produced the seventh-lowest FIP (1.50) among all starters who’ve compiled at least 10.0 innings this season, according to FanGraphs.com.

Granted, these remarkable results have been created over an extremely small sample size, however, they were largely made possible because of the success of deGrom’s high-90s fastball. It may not seem possible, but his four-seamer has actually progressed even further in 2021, which is mind-boggling because it was already considered one the top heaters in the major leagues heading into this season.

After averaging a career-high 98.6 mph with his fastball in 2020, the 2014 NL Rookie of the Year award winner has increased its average velocity up to 99.1 mph (second-highest average velocity) in 2021 and has been utilizing it 73.8% of the time, which is the third-highest usage among all qualified pitchers, according to BaseballSavant.com.

Along with increasing its velocity, deGrom has also been gradually improving his four-seamer’s vertical and horizontal movements over the last few seasons and has reached a new high point in each of those categories during Year Eight with the Mets.

In 2019, the hard-throwing righty averaged 12.2 inches of drop and was able to reduce that number by 0.8 inches during the following season, down to just 11.4 inches of drop. But thanks to its increased velocity, his heater is now averaging 11.0 inches of drop, allowing him to locate it higher in the strike zone.

As for his fastball’s side-to-side movements, the former ninth-round selection only averaged 5.8 inches of break on his primary weapon in 2019, although he improved its horizontal break up to 6.9 inches during the 2020 campaign. Making another key adjustment this season, the Stetson University product is currently averaging 10.0 inches of break with his four-seamer, which is the most movement it’s ever created throughout his career.

Taking into account these pivotal changes, deGrom has pinpointed the location of his fastball almost perfectly through his first two outings of the season, preventing hitters from generating considerable damage against it. Even though Miami Marlins shortstop Jazz Chisholm crushed a 402-foot home run off his heater back on Apr. 10, the veteran righty has still been extremely effective with his accuracy and that’s allowed him to rely heavily on his favorite offering early on.

Here’s where deGrom has located his four-seamer in 2021:

As a result of this location, the Florida native’s fastball has recorded career-bests in AVG (.182), xAVG (.192), wOBA (.233), whiff rate (39.0%), in zone whiff rate (37.5%), walk rate (2.9%), LD rate (15.8%) and PU rate (26.3%).

Comparing these stellar metrics to the rest of the league, deGrom is currently tied for the best run value (-4), owns the second-highest strikeout (41.2%) and whiff rates, the third-lowest xAVG and xwOBA (.268), the fourth-lowest wOBA, the sixth-lowest AVG and the eighth-lowest SLG (.333) among all pitchers who’ve earned at least 25 plate appearances against their fastball.

Considering pitcher Carlos Carrasco remains sidelined with a torn hamstring, although he’s expected to begin working out at the alternate site in Brooklyn very shortly, the Mets will be counting on deGrom to continue his dominance for an extended period. Having said that, it’ll also be extremely beneficial for the club’s offense to provide him with some run support moving forward, as they’ve scored just three runs over his first two starts.

Taking this lack of run support even further, the future hall-of-famer owns a disappointing 6-36 record when receiving two runs of support or fewer throughout his career, which is very troubling since he’s posted a 2.96 ERA and a 29.1% strikeout rate during those situations.

With deGrom eligible to opt-out of his current five-year, $137.5 million contract after the 2022 campaign, his willingness to potentially fulfill the entirety of his deal or sign an extension with the Mets would likely increase significantly if his team enjoys a successful season in 2021, allowing him to participate in the playoffs for just the second time in his career.

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