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Strasburgian Starts

John Cougar Lunchbucket
Jun 10 2010 09:17 AM

(Copied and pasted from the nbf)
Today at mbtn.net's wildly popular and exciting "Meet the Dicks" series, I wrote about Dick Rusteck who 44 years ago today threw a 4-hit, complete game shutout over the Reds at Shea Stadium in his Met and major league debut. (As you know, I also made my debut that day, though drawing additional parallels afterward is a little depressing to consider, as Rusteck followed up that magnificent arrival with arm troubles that would prevent him from ever having another quality start and an altogether a brief career.

http://mbtn.net/master-all-way-meet-dicks-part-3

Anyhow, with help of an exclusive Ultimate Mets Dataquery, we got a list of all Met rookies who made their Mets debuts as starters, and the results of those games. Magic!

As I suspected, Rusteck is the Mets' all-time Strasburgian Starter, going 9 innings, allowing 0 runs and 4 singles. Nobody even reached 2nd base.

Here are a few more quality-start debuts, courtesy UMDB:

Gary Gentry, 4/10/69: 8.2 IP, 7 H, 2 ER
Brent Gaff, 7/7/82: 7.2 IP, 8 H, 0 ER
Masato Yoshii, 4/5/98: 7 IP, 3 H, 0 ER
Rick Anderson, 6/9/86: 7 IP, 4 H, 0 ER
Jason Isringhausen, 7/17/95: 7 IP, 2 H, 2 ER
Jon Matlack, 7/11/71: 7 IP, 7 H, 2 ER
Nino Espinosa, 9/13/74: 8 IP, 8 H, 3 ER

* * *
And some other notable Met starters and their MLB/Met debuts:
Seaver, 4/13/67: 5.1 IP, 6 H, 2 ER
Darling, 9/6/83: 6.1 IP, 5 H, 1 ER
Gooden, 4/7/84: 5 IP, 3 H, 1 ER
Wilson, 4/4/96: 6 IP, 6 H, 3 ER
Jones, 8/14/93: 6 IP, 7 H, 1 ER
Pelfrey, 7/8/06: 5 IP, 5 H, 2 ER

* * *
Notable stinkers
Darrell Sutherland, 6/28/64: 0.1 IP, 3 H, 5 ER
Grant Roberts, 7/27/00: 1.1 IP, 6 H, 6 ER
Jon Niese, 9/2/08: 3 IP, 7 H, 5 ER

Edgy DC
Jun 10 2010 09:39 AM
Re: Strasburgian Starts

Aaron Heliman, L, 2003:
6.0 IP / 6 H / 5 R / 1 ER / 2 BB / 2 SO

Undone by errors by Bono, Burnitz, Reyes, and himself.

Nino Espinosa, ND, 1974:
8.0 IP / 8 H / 3 R / 3 H / 0 BB / 2 SO

Two-run homer to Andre Thornton. Typical Nino --- low walks, low whiffs.

Neil Allen, L, 1979:
6.0 IP / 7 H / 3 R / 3 ER / 1 BB / 1 SO

Orosco and McDowell also came up as starters, but as the number five starter, they each appeared out of the bullpen before their first starts came around.

MFS62
Jun 10 2010 09:40 AM
Re: Strasburgian Starts

Great job JCL.
But shouldn't you be getting ready for your surprise birth..... (oh shit. I ruined it).

Later

Benjamin Grimm
Jun 10 2010 10:32 AM
Re: Strasburgian Starts

Others that came up in my SQL results that tickled my memory:

Juan Berenguer's debut in 1978, because I was there and was excited at seeing a new star pitcher debut. (Oh well.)

And Tim Leary, of course. I remember watching the first inning at my aunt's house, but then got called away for meal time, and when I got back to the TV not long after, he was out of the game! There was no Internet to run to, so I had to wait for the broadcasters to revisit the topic.