Game Notes – 06/25/2025

Jacob deGrom started attacking (and silencing) big league hitters for the official accounting on May 15, 2014, when he allowed a single run over seven innings (and took the loss in a 1-0 affair).  The right-hander was 25 years old for this debut and with four hits and two walks allowed, offered some little flash of what would so often occur over the next decade:  at the end of his day’s work, a line flaunting more innings thrown than walks and hits surrendered.  It’s hard enough to script a sub-one WHIP for an entire season; it’s historic when accomplished for an entire career of any length.  

Jacob deGrom allowed one hit and two walks in seven scoreless frames and improved to 8-2.  For the year, the Rangers righty owns a 2.08 ERA and has held batters to a .189 average and a .538 OPS.  Let’s dig into some of these numbers and then close with a career-focused jaunt.

~The Rangers are at the numerical halfway point in their season.  Looking at all teams at this exact point in the franchise’s history, deGrom’s 2.08 ERA comes in as the third lowest (min. 15 GS), behind Rick Honeycutt’s 1.52 in 1983 and Kyle Gibson’s 2.00 in 2021.  

~Regarding deGrom’s .189 batting average-against … the lowest BAA for any Senators/Rangers pitcher at the All-Star break (with a minimum of 15 starts) is Nolan Ryan’s .183 in 1989.  Under these same conditions, the lowest OPS-against is Rick Honeycutt’s .538 in 1983 (again, that’s deGrom’s number right now).

~There are 778 pitchers who can claim at least 200 career starts, including deGrom.  There is one pitcher among all these hurlers who can claim a lower career WHIP than deGrom’s 0.987 – Addie Joss and his 0.968.  A few other active pitchers are among the top 15:  Clayton Kershaw (1.013) ranks fourth; Chris Sale (1.049) ranks sixth; Max Scherzer (1.079) ranks 11th; Gerrit Cole (1.089) ranks 12th.  

In his third career start, Jacob Misiorowski allowed two hits and two walks with eight strikeouts over five scoreless frames and improved to 3-0.  His tallies over these three wins:  16.0 IP, 3 hits, 7 walks, 19 K’s, 1.13 ERA.  

~Among all pitchers in the modern era through their first three games, the Brewers’ right-hander is one of four to have at least 15.0 IP, all three outings come in starts and have his innings total be at least three times his hits allowed.  

1970     Wayne Simpson (7 hits in 25.0 IP)

1975     Mike Norris (4 hits in 16.0 IP)

2022     Luis Ortiz (5 hits in 15.1 IP)

2025     Jacob Misiorowski (3 hits in 16.0 IP)

~In the liveball era, Misiorowski is the 45th who’s opened a career with wins in each of his first three outings (all starts).  Among these, his 1.13 ERA comes in 12th, snuggled between a 1.08 (Don Aase in 1977, Andy Rincon in 1980) and Jason Jennings’ 1.23 in 2001.  Current Reds hurler Andrew Abbott posted a 0.00 in 2023.  Wayne Simpson, referenced above for his hit suppression, posted a 0.36.

Yusei Kikuchi fanned 12 and recorded a win as the Angels took down the Red Sox.  The left-hander is the third oldest (34 years and eight days old) Halos hurler to post at least a dozen K’s, after a pair of Chuck Finley games.  That southpaw fanned 13 at the age of 34 years and 222 days in 1997 and two years later, struck out 12 at the age of 36 years and 262 days.

Nick Pivetta was the main attraction in the Padres’ 1-0 win over the Nationals, working the first seven and allowing just three baserunners (on three singles) with 10 strikeouts.  

~Pivetta has four games this season that have seen him work seven scoreless innings and allow no more than three hits.  

Padres History:  Most Games in a Season Featuring 7+ IP, 0 Runs, 3 or Fewer Hits

6     Jake Peavy (2007)

5     Dylan Cease (2024)

4     Chris Young (2007), Drew Pomeranz (2016), Joe Musgrove (2021), Nick Pivetta (2025)

~Pivetta posted the 36th game in Padres history featuring 10-plus K’s and no walks.  Sterling Hitchcock’s 15 strikeouts are the most in a Padres’ no-walk effort, coming on August 29, 1998.

~Pivetta has started and won four of San Diego’s 13 team shutouts this season.  Jake Peavy’s seven from 2007 is the gold standard for the franchise.  Those 13 team shutouts land on a more historically significant tier, tying for the 24th most since 1901 for any club through 80 games.  San Diego’s 13 through 80 contests are the most since 2014, when St. Louis had 15 and Texas possessed 14.

José Ramírez’s 902nd career RBI was a memorable one, coming from a single in the bottom of the 10th to give Cleveland a 5-4 win.  The switch-hitter has seven career walk-off hits, tied for the fifth most for any Indian/Guardian in the past 50 years.  His 902 career RBI are fifth most in franchise history.

1976-2025:  Most Walk-off Hits With Cleveland

10    Jim Thome

8      Cory Snyder, Albert Belle, Omar Vizquel

7      José Ramírez, Carlos Santana

1901-2025:  Most RBI for Cleveland

1,084    Earl Averill

937       Jim Thome

919       Nap Lajoie

911       Hal Trosky

902       José Ramírez

Juan Soto’s two homers helped lift the Mets to a win on Wednesday and raised his multi-homer presence to an unprecedented level.  With 27 of them, Soto has more before turning 27 years old than anyone in history.  This list, now starting with the Mets’ slugger, trails into Jimmie Foxx (26) and then Mel Ott, Eddie Mathews and Álex Rodríguez (25 apiece).

Ronald Acuña, Jr. singled and drew a pair of walks.  In each of his last 15 games, the outfielder has reached safely at least twice.  The 27-year-old is now alone with the third longest streak of this kind by a Brave in the modern era.  Rogers Hornsby authored a 17-game run in 1928 and in 1994, Deion Sanders had a 16-game streak.   Between Sanders and Acuna, Jr., time-wise, there are 16 others across the Majors who’ve authored a streak of at least 15 games, with Barry Bonds (2004) and Joey Votto (2017) sharing the longest run, at 20 games.

Yankees left-hander Max Fried allowed an unearned run over seven innings and improved to 10-2 with a 1.92 ERA.  Since teams began working through a 162-game schedule (1961), there are 615 pitchers to be halfway to 20 wins by the time their teams played 81 games.  Among all these potential 20-game winners, Fried’s 1.92 ERA ranks as the 36th lowest, in between the 1.91 from Sandy Koufax in 1965 and Bill Travers in 1976 and the 1.94 from Jerry Koosman in 1968 and Ken Holtzman in 1973.  There are two Yankees on this list with a lower ERA than Fried’s:  Ron Guidry in 1978 (13-0, 1.75 ERA) and Phil Niekro in 1984 (11-4, 1.84 ERA).  

Twins right-hander Joe Ryan yielded three singles across six no-run, no-walk frames to improve to 8-3 with a 0.887 WHIP (third lowest in the Majors).  When it comes to pitchers with the franchise hitting the All-Star break with a superior WHIP, Ryan has a significant presence.  Let’s throw his mark as it currently stands into the mix just to stress this point.

1933-2025:  Lowest WHIP for a Senator/Twin at the ASB (min. 15 GS)

0.887     Joe Ryan in 2025

0.967     Dean Chance in 1968

1.000     Johan Santana in 2006

1.003     Joe Ryan in 2024

1.006     Jim Kaat in 1972

1.009     Joe Ryan in 2023

Bobby Witt, Jr. stroked his MLB-leading 27th double.  He is tied with George Brett (1988) for the third most two-base hits at this point of a Royal season (80 games), the pair behind Mike Sweeney (34 in 2001) and José Guillén (28 in 2008).

Ian Happ’s homer to start the first inning was the start of a three-RBI day for the 30-year-old:  the eighth time this season he’s posted a three-RBI (or more) effort while batting leadoff.  The most such lines in a season for a Cub since 1901 belongs to Alfonso Soriano, who had 10 of them in 2008 (Happ’s eight are the second most).  Since 1901, the most three-plus RBI games from a leadoff hitter in a season for any team rests with Harvey Kuenn (1956) and Grady Sizemore (2008), each with a baker’s dozen.

The Astros defeated the Phillies, 2-0. The day before, they edged Philadelphia, 1-0.  Houston has enjoyed (sweated through?) seven back-to-back games in which they won 1-0 or 2-0.  The first of these streaks came in 1962, when they took down the Cubs 2-0 on consecutive days.  One of the other streaks also came against the Phillies: a pair of 1-0 wins in August of 1974.  Before this two-game run, the last streak of this kind for the franchise came in 1992.

With his Dodgers hitting the numerical halfway point of the season, Shohei Ohtani crossed the plate twice to bring his big league-best tally up to 79 runs scored.  Since teams began working through a 162-game schedule (1961), Ohtani is one of four to have reached 79 runs scored at this 81-game mark.  In 1994, Frank Thomas had 88, while 2000 saw Álex Rodríguez with 82 runs and Todd Helton with 81.

Max Muncy connected for his second grand slam in his past three games as part of a six-RBI night at the plate.  Since joining the Dodgers in 2018, Muncy has connected for eight slams, tied for the most by any player in the Majors (he’s matched with Cody Bellinger, Aaron Judge and Matt Olson).  The Dodgers have four more games this June – perhaps four more chances for Muncy to match Mike Piazza’s team record for slams in a month (Piazza’s three came in April of 1998). 

Thanks to Baseball Reference and its extraordinary research database, Stathead, for help in assembling this piece.