Jacob deGrom's career trajectory

[Angelsjunky]

This is NOT a thread to talk about how the Angels can acquire deGrom. Rather, I find him an interesting player in how his career has unfolded, and had a question I wanted to cast out to AW; I was going to post this in the prospects thread, but thought I'd open it up a bit.

DeGrom is interesting because of being a late-bloomer, becoming one of the best pitchers in baseball in his early 30s. But le's go back.

DeGrom wasn't even selected out of high school. He was exclusively a shortstop during his first two years of college at Stetson, but due to weak hitting became a SS/RP in his junior year. After excelling, he was inserted into the rotation midseason, making 12 starts. 12 starts in college - that's it! Fun fact: he hit his only HR of the 2009 season against Chris Sale.

DeGrom was taken by the Mets in the 9th round in the 2010 draft, with a $95,000 signing bonus. He pitched 6 games for the Mets' Rookie team with a 5.19 ERA, but missed all of 2011 due to Tommy John Surgery. When he came back in 2012, he was a different pitcher; he had a 2.43 ERA in A/A+, although at 24, pretty old for that level. His 2013 wasn't as good, a 4.51 ERA across three levels (A+/AA/AAA), but with good peripherals (46-120 BB-K in 147.2 IP); he was dominant in 7 AAA starts in 2014 before being called up to the Mets, and has been excellent to great since.

While deGrom didn't become an elite pitcher until 2018, he was good as soon as he arrived in the majors. In 2014, his rookie year, he started 22 games with a 2.69 ERA, winning the NL Rookie of the Year at the age of 26 (his first start was at age 25, but it was his age 26 season). For his first four years, 2014-17, he was 13th in the majors with a 15.5 fWAR, or an average of 3.9 per year. That was his age 26-29 seasons.

In 2018, at the age of 30, he become one of the best pitchers in baseball - one of maybe half a dozen true aces, winning the NL Cy Young. In fact, you could argue that he's the best pitcher in baseball right now, leading all pitchers in both fWAR (16.0) and ERA (2.05) over the last two seasons.

Here's his ERA and fWAR from 2014-19:

ERA: 2.69, 2.54, 3.04, 3.53, 1.70, 2.43 (career 2.62)

fWAR: 3.6, 4.9, 2.9, 4.1, 9.0, 7.0 (career 31.5)

His career Adjusted ERA (or ERA+) is 148, tied with Lefty Grove for 5th all-time among pitchers with at least 1000 IP.

So here's the question(s): How does a 9th rounder who barely pitches in college andd doesn't reach the majors until he's 26 years old turn into one of the best starters in baseball? And how to spot guys like this in the minors, and in college? Any other similar cases you can think of?

[Stradling]

Thanks for posting this, I assumed he was good in the minors and in college, based on him being really good up here.  I learned a lot reading this which I always appreciate.  

[T.G.]

13 hours ago, Angelsjunky said:

So here's the question(s): How does a 9th rounder who barely pitches in college andd doesn't reach the majors until he's 26 years old turn into one of the best starters in baseball? And how to spot guys like this in the minors, and in college? Any other similar cases you can think of?

Some guys just take longer to figure things out, I guess.  I've heard it said that it all comes down to "command."  Lots of guys have great "stuff" - but until they have command, they don't have an impact.

It's an interesting conversation for sure.

Look at Charlie Morton's first five years in the majors - four of those years were pretty bad.  He figured it out late.

 

[Dick B Back]

I always like the Percy story... minor league catcher that couldn’t hit so they try him at pitcher and he ends up with 300+ saves.

I have no idea if he had any college pitching experience.

[T.G.]

2 minutes ago, Dick B Back said:

I always like the Percy story... minor league catcher that couldn’t hit so they try him at pitcher and he ends up with 300+ saves.

I have no idea if he had any college pitching experience.

I thought of him too.  Lots of examples of guys who became pitchers because they couldn't hit. 

Another guy I looked at - even though he was a high draft pick... Trevor Bauer.  He's had a lot of "bad" seasons... and he's an example of someone who is highly touted and coveted, yet his career numbers aren't that impressive.  He "appears" to be good now - although the Reds might dispute that. He made his MLB debut in 2012 (4 starts) and had 4 more starts in 2013 and then was mediocre from 2014-2017 and didn't look like an ace until he 2018.

I know none of these examples are similar to de Grom... but it's still interesting.

[Blarg]

14 hours ago, Angelsjunky said:

Any other similar cases you can think of?

[Docwaukee]

nice post AJ.  

I think deGrom's situation is very very rare.  More so on his pre-pro days.  Anyone with an arm like his will get some mound time at the college level regardless of whether they project as a future pitcher.  You just don't see guys under the radar like that.  I think teams are already very cognizant of trying to throw a guy on the mound to see what he's got from a very early point in their career when they have a good arm.  So while you might see it happen once in a great while, what's more likely is a guy who's always been a pitcher but doesn't find his stuff until age 27/28.  Like a Kluber or Arrieta.  

But anyone with the right body and a good arm is gonna at least get evaluated on the bump.  Frankly, I think that's always been going on.  Once in a while though, someone slips through the cracks and I think the guy who slips through happens even less often now.  

[Jay]

Boise Hawks are now part of the Rockies system.

Haven't been out to a game yet, they really suck.

 

[Mark68]

I drafted deGrom on my fantasy team his rookie year. It was after his first couple starts in the Show. I haven't looked back. I rode him, Nola, and Ryu to the league championship this year (all of whom I drafted as rookies).

It's really hard to peg some of these late bloomers. As has been mentioned upthread, it might be a case of someone just figuring out how to be a pitcher instead of a "thrower". Look at Cole's first few seasons compared to his last two. He had the talent, but finally figured out how to harness it. For some pitchers, that comes later. 

This is probably why scouts grade a player's "makeup". They have to be willing to take instruction and figure out how to pitch in certain situations, with certain batters, and how to stay two steps ahead of the batter.

In the long run, that will help the pitcher's longevity. It helps them reinvent themselves when they inevitably lose a few ticks off the fastball. 

So, to sort of answer your question, stuff does matter. But so does what is between the ears. DeGrom had good stuff going through the minors, but it always played down until he learned how to actually pitch. 

[NorCal Halo]

"How does a 9th rounder who barely pitches in college and doesn't reach the majors until he's 26 years old turn into one of the best starters in baseball? And how to spot guys like this in the minors, and in college?"

 

I know what you mean.  It used to be easy to spot these diamonds in the rough just by finding the local HGH dealer.  (too soon?)

[kevinb]

Hard work. Right coaching. Training. 

How do you find them? A lot of it is luck? If people thought he was going to be this good they wouldn't have waited till the 9th round to grab him. Sometimes it's just about getting lucky. Like we did w Trout. If people thought Trout would be this good he would have gone 1st, sometimes you just get lucky.