Jacob deGrom's third rehab start is in the books, as the righty threw 42 pitches (29 strikes) over four innings for Triple-A Syracuse, allowing one unearned run on two hits, striking out four and walking one.
DeGrom had a 1-2-3 first, then put two on with no one out in the second before a strikeout and double play ball got him out of the inning. A single, an error, and a wild pitch accounted for the unearned run in the third, but he finished by retiring the final four in a row.
"I feel good," said deGrom. "I felt a little out of whack the first couple of innings but then tried to make a little bit of an adjustment. I wasn't locating my fastball quite like I wanted to early on but then the last couple of innings felt a lot better. I was flying open a little bit."
DeGrom started mixing in his breaking balls as the game went on, and finished with his highest pitch count so far, ramping up from 30 to 36 to 42 pitches in his three outings so far.
"The goal today was try to start getting the pitch count up," he said. "Like I said, I was working on trying to locate the fastball and pitch off of that. I threw some good offspeed, it wasn't quite where I wanted to, but like I said, I haven't really pitched in a game in a year so it's going to be a little bit of figuring out that release point as well. But all in all, I felt like I accomplished what I came out here to do."
With every minor-league off during the MLB All-Star break, deGrom's next outing will be a simulated game of sorts early next week. Mets manager Buck Showalter confirmed that on Thursday, meaning that deGrom won't be back until later in the month at the earliest, but the Mets are being incredibly careful with their ace.
"This process was pretty thorough with reaching these different thresholds of throwing before I even stepped on the mound," deGrom said. "Everything was on a radar gun, like, 'each day you're going to throw this hard and no harder than that.' It was very thorough and step-by-step, so I've been trying to trust the process and not do too much, because if I did it again, I was out for the year."
July 7 marked exactly one year since deGrom's last MLB outing, and while he's not happy with that timeline, he understands it's what needs to be done for the long-term.
"It hasn't been that much fun, but trying to stick to the process," deGrom said. "I want to be up there helping the team, but with this injury it was kind of cut and dry how you have to take this amount of time and then slowly work your way back. It stinks being out, but getting close now so definitely ready to be back out there."
Could that call back to the Majors come after next week's simulation?
"That will be a discussion that we have in the following week or so," he said.
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