Texas Rangers starting pitcher Jacob deGrom made baseball history as the fastest pitcher ever to reach 1,800 strikeouts, but a tough divisional loss to the Seattle Mariners marred his record-setting day.
On Sunday afternoon, the ace right-hander struck out Mariners shortstop J.P. Crawford in the second inning, etching his name into the record books by reaching 1,800 career K’s in just 240 games and 1,493 1/3 innings.
The previous best marks belonged to Hall of Famer Randy Johnson, who hit the milestone in 243 games, and Chris Sale, who did it in 1,498 innings.
Rather than addressing the historic achievement, deGrom focused on the loss to the Mariners and said the Rangers “needed to win” that game.
“We need to win series. Once we lost the first two, we needed to at least split here. Like I said, I came out and threw the ball terribly. It’s on me. We gotta go back home and get back on track,” he said, according to MLB.com.
Rangers Manager Bruce Bochy acknowledged it was a difficult road trip for both deGrom and the club, which left Texas 2-5 after stops in Anaheim and Seattle.
“We lost some tough games. Today was another one. They’re battling out there. I’ll say that it was a tough day for Jacob. He was off with this command that was evident. … There’s no use dwelling on it, you know? I think that’s fair to say that it could have been different. This road trip today was a tough one,” he said, per MLB.com.
Moving forward, Texas will have to string together some wins if it hopes to make the postseason as an American League wild-card team.
Currently, the Rangers have an overall record of 58-55, which leaves them two games behind the Mariners for the last spot in the postseason.
Additionally, the Rangers have lost every regular-season series against the Mariners this year, meaning the team must finish with a better overall record to claim the final spot, as any tie will go in favor of Seattle.
The good news is that this team still has 49 games remaining in the regular season, meaning the various pitching additions will have an opportunity to step in and make an impact for a team looking to eventually make a deep postseason run.
