Jacob

deGrom

deGrom gave up four hits, walked none and struck out five. The four-inning outing is the longest of his three starts this year. He only threw 53 pitches. Despite not pitching deep into games, deGrom looks good enough in a limited showing that fantasy managers should have interest in taking him in the early rounds of 2025 drafts.

He allowed three hits and one walk along with the aforementioned five punchouts. It was another reminder of how incredible deGrom can be when he’s on the mound, even while allowing a solo homer to Josh Rojas in the third frame. The 36-year-old has allowed just that one run in his two starts — both against Seattle — with nine strikeouts against a single walk. It could change, but right now deGrom is scheduled to make his final start of the year against the Angels on Friday.

There was a slim chance deGrom might go five if everything broke right tonight, but he was quite impressive in getting his 11 outs. His fastball averaged 97.2 mph and topped out at 98.7 mph. He wound up with 10 missed swings and a 33% CSW in the 61-pitch outing. It looks like he’ll make his next start Friday against the Blue Jays. That would leave him with just two starts over the remainder of the season.

DeGrom will make his long-awaited return from Tommy John surgery against the Mariners tonight. It’ll be his first major league appearance since Apr. 28, 2023.

DeGrom made his last rehab start on Saturday. He allowed one hit and struck out five batters. The 36-year-old was Rookie of the Year in 2014, has won two Cy Young awards and is a four-time All-Star. DeGrom last pitched in April of 2023 and has been out for over a year due to Tommy John surgery.

The right-hander struck out five and allowed just one hit. Assuming deGrom checks out well after the outing, this was his final rehab appearance, and the expectation is the 36-year-old will make his next start as a member of the Rangers. There will always be injury risk here, but the risk will carry a considerable amount of reward with it.

Scherzer and Jacob deGrom are both making rehab starts Saturday, and both are hopefully going to make their way to Texas after. Scherzer is only expected to pitch two innings tonight for Triple-A Round Rock, so it’s likely the 40-year-old will be in maintenance mode even when he does make the return to the bump. That makes him a risky streaming option for the rest of the year.

After learning that deGrom had said he might rejoin the Rangers this weekend, Bochy stated: “Thats an option. But I don’t think that’s what we’re going to do.” The current plan is for deGrom to pitch for Double-A Frisco on Saturday, with Max Scherzer starting for Triple-A Round Rock the same day.

That would explain why Max Scherzer was scheduled to make a rehab start Saturday, which is the day deGrom had been expected to pitch in the minors. Now it looks like he’ll be doing it in the majors instead. We’re certainly looking forward to seeing him back, but expect it to be a brief outing; he’s topped out at 2 2/3 innings and 48 pitches through three rehab starts as he returns from Tommy John.

DeGrom threw 48 pitches and averaged 97.8 mph with his 18 fastballs. He’s expected to make one more start in the minors before joining the Rangers. As slowly as the team is bringing him along, he probably won’t be ready to go five in his first MLB start.