It looks like Marcus Storman is finally comfortable in a Mets uniform. Unfortunately, it may be a little too late.
Stroman’s first month as a Met was one filled with a lot of team success, but not a lot of personal achievement for New York’s newest starting pitcher. Stroman pitched to a 4.91 ERA in five August starts, but the Mets won in each of his first four. Then came Stroman’s start on August 27th against the Cubs, when he allowed four runs in six innings and the Mets lost 5-2. New York would then lose both of his next two starts, dropping the team’s record to 4-3 when Stroman is on the mound.
Over his last two outings, Stroman has turned things around, as he finally begins to show the promise that led the Mets to trade for him at the deadline. Last Thursday, Stroman recorded an out in the seventh inning for the first time as a Met, pitching 6 1/3 innings of one-run ball against the Arizona Diamondbacks.
Last night, Stroman improved upon that start by completing seven innings against the Colorado Rockies without yielding a single run.
The best indicator of when Marcus Stroman is pitching effectively is when he is getting groundouts, as he is a traditional sinkerball pitcher. In his first seven starts with the Mets, Stroman was only getting 44.2% of batted balls hit on the ground. Over his last two starts, that number has skyrocketed to 56.2%.
The increase in ground balls was evident early on against the Colorado Rockies, as he recorded two ground outs in the first inning. Stroman also struck out Nolan Arenado, needing just 10 pitches to retire the side in order. The second inning brought Stroman’s only walk of the game, but he quickly erased the baserunner by getting a double-play ball. He then picked up another strikeout to get out of another inning facing the minimum.
You can only keep the ball on the ground so long in the thin Denver air and the Rockies began to lift pitches from Stroman after the second inning. Luckily most of those balls landed in the mitts of Mets outfielders, as Stroman retired nine of the next 11 hitters that he faced, three of them on strikeouts.
The Mets then exploded for four runs in the top of the sixth inning, hitting three home runs, giving Stroman his first lead of the night. In the bottom of the frame, Stroman worked around a single by Trevor Story by recording three ground outs.
In the seventh inning, Stroman allowed a base hit to Charlie Blackmon to lead things off, before getting an out on a well-struck ball off the bat of Ryan McMahon. The last batter he faced was Raimel Tapia, who worked a full count against Stroman. On the payoff pitch, Stroman threw a cutter that fell off the table to strike out Tapia on an ugly swing. To Stroman’s delight, Blackmon was gunned out by Wilson Ramos on the play, for a strike em’ out, throw em’ out double play.
That marked the end of Stroman’s day, which saw him need just 95 pitches to work his way through seven scoreless innings of work. Stroman allowed four singles, walked one and struck out seven in his most dominant outing since coming to the Mets. The two straight quality starts by Stroman have lowered his ERA from 3.42 down to 3.21.
“I just feel like I have made adjustments over the past two weeks, kind of changed my delivery and mechanics a bit and it’s paying off.” Stroman said. “Me and Ramos were on a really good page as far as sequencing and pitch-calling, are sequences today were awesome.”
