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There is such an inundation of statistics to illustrate the greatness of Jacob deGrom that it becomes somewhat baffling and mostly awe-inspiring. But for the pitcher who comes out to the song “Simple Man,” the figures which best describe deGrom’s brilliance against the Washington Nationals at Citi Field a year ago are quite straightforward: 15 strikeouts, two hits, nine shutout innings.

And for anyone who might think that’s not enough (and I’d love to find out who did), he can also swing the bat. DeGrom was slotted in the No. 8 spot in the batting order, and made a case he should be higher. Because in the fifth inning, he broke a scoreless tie with a double to left field to extend a five-game hitting streak dating to 2019. “M-V-P!” chants reigned down from the pandemic-limited Citi Field crowd of 8,000-plus for the man who can literally do it all. They continued when he singled in the eighth. On a night he gave up just two hits, he got two hits.

Back to deGrom’s specialty. Of the 109 pitches he threw to Nationals batters, ten were at least 100 miles per hour. Five of those were thrown in a typically breezy first inning. Since the start of the 2020 season, deGrom had reached triple figures on 33 first-inning pitches. According to MLB Statcast, the next highest was eight.

Andrew Stevenson doubled with two outs in the third. He would be the last National to reach base. Of the last 19 deGrom set down in order, nine were retired via strikeout. He struck out the side in the sixth and seventh innings — giving him a career-high 15. That bested his previous high of 14, which included the last two times he took the mound in Miami and Colorado. He joined Pedro Martinez in 1999 and Gerrit Cole in 2019 as the only pitchers to fan 14 or more in three straight appearances.

It was the 49th time in deGrom’s career that he tallied 10 Ks or more, and his 50 over the first four starts of 2021 was a major league record.

When he got Josh Harrison on a grounder that Pete Alonso fielded and fittingly fed to deGrom on the bag, the Mets’ two-time Cy Young winner had a razor-thin ERA of 0.31 and a WHIP of 0.55.

He didn’t needed to show off his hitting ability — which frankly had been better than some actual Mets hitters to this point — but deGrom did anyway. He was the first Mets pitcher not to bat ninth since he was the eight-place hitter for his last start of his epic 2018 season on Sept. 26. After his eighth-inning single, deGrom had six hits in 11 at-bats — a .545 batting average.

When considering the greatest performance in the career of Jacob deGrom, you’d have to consider the deciding game of the 2015 NLDS in which he battled through the sixth inning without his elite stuff and gave the Mets an opportunity to advance as well as his one-hitter against the Phillies in 2017. The April evening at Citi Field against the Nats was Jacob deGrom at his all-around best.