The New York Mets announced late Monday night that Jacob deGrom can begin “loading and strengthening” his injured right shoulder after an MRI revealed “considerable healing of the stress reaction on his scapula.”
While it made no mention of when the ace can begin throwing again, it’s a good bit of news for the Mets as deGrom’s shoulder will be re-imaged in three weeks.
The announcement came after Mets manager Buck Showalter opted not to divulge any information before his team’s series opener against the St. Louis Cardinals.
“I’m not getting involved with that,” Showalter said. “We’ll keep up to date as much as we know. He’s doing well.”
The two-time Cy Young Award winner was shut down shortly before the start of the 2022 season due to a stress reaction in his right shoulder — his 11th injury in the last 21 months — which forced him to be completely shut down from throwing for four weeks.
As soon as he’s cleared, the 33-year-old right-hander will begin a throwing program that is expected to take one month to properly ramp him up to rejoin the team and take the mound.
While this latest injury has robbed baseball of its best pitcher even more — especially after last year when a historic campaign was cut short in July — it’s presented the Mets with one of its largest challenges of their early goings. And they’ve been passing it with flying colors so far in 2022.
Tylor Megill has been superb filling in for deGrom — the second-year pitcher going 3-0 with a 2.35 ERA and 0.913 WHIP over four starts so far. That includes a 6.2-inning outing on Sunday evening against the Arizona Diamondbacks in which he allowed just two runs on five hits while striking out seven.
The Mets’ starting rotation, which has also been without Taijuan Walker, has also responded with a sterling 2.46 ERA over the first 17 games of the regular season.
David Peterson, who replaced Walker for two turns in the rotation, was optioned down to Triple-A on Sunday, indicating that Walker is close to returning, too.
Walker confirmed on Monday that after throwing a four-inning simulated game, he’s expecting to pitch this upcoming weekend against the Philadelphia Phillies.
