Mets: Jacob deGrom continues brilliance after skid ending performance

After pitching seven shutout innings against the Angels last night, Jacob deGrom continued his dominant streak against American League teams.

Since he made his debut in 2014, deGrom had started 11 games against American League teams. During those games held them to a combined 1.95 ERA. Take out his four starts against the Red Sox and Yankees and his ERA over the other seven games stand at a remarkable 1.29.

In fact, going back to the start of the 2016 season, deGrom has only given up two runs over 27.2 innings versus the Angels, Yankees, Tigers, and White Sox.

After giving up at least three runs in each of his last five starts, this was a nice change. He brought his ERA down to 3.56, the lowest point it’s been since April.

DeGrom struck the Angels out nine times over his seven innings of work. This was the fifth time this season he’s struck out at least nine. This was also the eighth consecutive game where he averaged at least a strikeout per inning.

His 76 strikeouts are the most by a National League pitcher, six ahead of Max Scherzer who starts today. DeGrom is on pace to beat his career high for strikeouts, which he set in 2015 with 205. Mets pitchers have reached 200 strikeouts, only ten times since 1990, including deGrom in 2015 and Noah Syndergaard last season.

DeGrom did have trouble with a blister late in the game and worked himself into a bases loaded-no out situation. However, he made it through and hopefully this does not become something troubling.

He now has a 3-1 record on the season and a career 5-3 record against American League teams. For the first time in a while, deGrom had started looking more like himself. More like what we saw in spring training and during his rookie and sophomore campaigns.

Next: Mets GM meets with training staff daily, but is it enough?

Maybe this outing was a sign of a good change for both deGrom and the Mets.