There was a matchup on Wednesday night at Yankee Stadium that included someone -- Aaron Judge -- who is almost certainly going to end up in the Hall of Fame, and someone else -- Jacob deGrom -- who should. If deGrom, back in New York and pitching there the way he once did for the Mets, is blessed with good health for the rest of his career -- I know, it’s an if bigger than even Judge -- he might even beat No. 99 to Cooperstown someday.
They faced each other three times in a game Jasson Domínguez of the Yankees eventually won with a walk-off home run in the bottom of the ninth. Judge walked his first time up, and deGrom finally got him to pop out after going at him for what seemed like an hour in an epic at-bat. That was all before Judge scorched a ground-ball out the last time the two faced each other. By the time Judge tied things with an RBI single in the eighth, deGrom was out of the game after 103 pitches.
Later, the quote from Judge was this about Jacob deGrom, now 36 years old:
“One of the greatest pitchers of his generation.”
That is what deGrom has been around his surgeries and all the time missed out of what should have been the prime of his career. Fact is -- and facts are more stubborn in baseball than in any other sport -- when deGrom has had a baseball in his right hand, he has been historically great.
What Yankees fans saw with deGrom back in the big city on Wednesday night is what Mets fans saw across town at Citi Field when his starts were known as deGrom Day and you didn’t want to miss one of them; when they were as much a pitching event as Dwight Gooden’s starts once were at Shea Stadium when he was young, and he was the Mets ace who looked like the best pitcher in the world.
Jacob deGrom pitched seven innings against the Yankees and looked as if he were on his way to a win before Cody Bellinger took him out of the park in the seventh and made the game 2-2. But while he was out there, he looked like everything he ever was as a Met: Nine strikeouts, one walk, three hits. He was the same dazzling presence on the mound that he has always been when blessed with good health, something that hasn’t happened nearly often enough.
His first Tommy John surgery was in 2010, the year he turned 22. The second, after deGrom had left the Mets and signed a free-agent contract with the Rangers, was in June 2023. He finally came back at the end of last season to make three starts, pitching just 10 2/3 innings. But even in a small sample like that, he had a 1.69 ERA, 14 strikeouts against just one walk. Now this season, he has made 10 starts already, has a 4-1 record with a 2.33 ERA, has struck out 62 batters in 58 innings against just 12 walks, and he was knocking on the door of being 5-1 until Bellinger got him deep on Wednesday night.
You still put deGrom’s best against anybody else’s. When he is out there, when he is making all of his starts, his stuff is still Hall of Fame stuff. Only way to describe it. The hope now, after everything that has happened to his right arm, is that he does what he says he intends to do -- pitches “for quite a while.”
You know the case against him making it to Cooperstown: Because of the arm injuries, he simply hasn’t pitched enough. His lifetime record stands at 88-58. In the 20th and 21st centuries, the lowest win total for a Hall of Fame starter is Dizzy Dean, with 150 -- another ace whose career was informed, and mightily, by injuries. Sandy Koufax, whose own remarkable career was shortened because of arthritis in his pitching elbow, made it to Cooperstown with 165 victories.
But look at what deGrom has been able to do when he has been injury-free, the laundry list of achievements that nearly give off a beam of light: Two Cy Young Awards, a season when he finished with an ERA of 1.70, the all-time leader in K/BB at 5.40. He’s twice led the world in strikeouts, led once in bWAR. He has 1,728 strikeouts (in 1,425 innings) for his career against just 320 walks. With everything that has happened to him already, his lifetime ERA stands, and proudly, at 2.51.
This is an era in baseball when starters pitch less than they ever have, and win totals absolutely don’t give off the beam of light for starters that they once did. So maybe when the time comes, and if -- another big one -- deGrom can have three or four or even five more seasons pitching at a high level, Hall of Fame voters will look at what Jacob deGrom did in his career, as opposed to what he didn’t.
One thing is certain, though: We should appreciate his talent now that he is back. Back in New York on Wednesday. Back pitching the way he once did for the Mets. Pitching against Judge on this night. Greatness against greatness.