Despite rough outing, deGrom determined to end season strong

ARLINGTON -- The first pitch of Monday night’s game left Jacob deGrom’s hand at 7:08 p.m. central time. At 7:08:22, Angels shortstop Zach Neto touched home plate after launching a leadoff homer against the Rangers ace.

deGrom began the day from behind and never caught up as the Rangers ultimately fell, 4-0, to the Angels to open the three-game set at Globe Life Field.

Neto’s leadoff homer was the fourth leadoff homer deGrom has allowed this year and just the second first-pitch leadoff home run against him in his career.

“Tonight was just inconsistent the whole time,” deGrom said. “I missed with a lot of sliders, missed with a fastball the first pitch of the game, and threw it right down the middle. Tonight it was just kind of all over the place. That was frustrating.”

This was deGrom’s first start back on the mound after the Rangers decided to skip his last turn through the rotation, which was scheduled for Aug. 20 in Kansas City, due to shoulder fatigue.

At the time, president of baseball operations Chris Young said that deGrom didn’t want to skip his start, preferring instead to be pushed back a day or two, but they sent him back to Arlington to get checked out by team physician Dr. Keith Meister, just to be sure everything was OK.

Everything, obviously, checked out physically. But deGrom wasn’t quite as sharp as he has been or can be. He allowed a pair of runs on three hits and two walks, getting through his five innings at 90 pitches -- which has been about the stopping point for him this season.

“That's what's frustrating about it,” deGrom said. “You go out there and you feel good. My bullpen in between felt really good. Warming up felt good. And then [I] go out there and am just not able to throw the ball where I want. Ball out of hand with the slider, just a lot of yanks. Five innings, two runs, 90 something pitches, it's just not very good. You have to be able to make pitches, and I didn't do a good job of that.”

deGrom is known to be critical of himself. Of course he’s a competitor. But it’s also hard to win any games where you don’t score a run. In the loss, the Rangers were shutout for the 12th time this season, tied for the third most time in the American League.

The shutout comes on the heels of the offense scoring four or more runs in five straight games, the third longest such streak of the season for Texas. The Rangers collected just five hits, all singles, and never sent more than four batters to the plate in a single inning. This comes after a stretch in which they had 10+ hits in six of their last eight games (beg. 8/17).

Of those five singles tonight, only two made it to second base.

“We ran into a well-pitched game,” said manager Bruce Bochy. “Sometimes, you just tip your cap. It's just one of those games where we ran into a really good pitcher.”

Regardless of the outcome, and the offensive production behind him, deGrom also reiterated his desire to make as many starts as possible this season. He got a team-high 25 starts already, and his 145 1/3 innings is well past any year he’s has since 2019, when he won his second straight NL Cy Young Award while crossing the 200-inning threshold for the third consecutive season.

“The goal is to take the ball as many times as I can and feel good,” deGrom said. “That's what has been going on. So [I’m going to] try to continue to take the ball, and just do a better job when I'm out there.”

Bochy added that there are no plans to shut deGrom down in the near future, even as the Rangers sit on the edge of the American League Wild Card race.

“He'll keep making starts until we think he needs a break. He feels good. Again, the stuff was really good. He's healthy, he feels good, as long as that's the case, yeah, he's gonna be out there.”