New York Mets' Luis Severino pitches during the first inning of a baseball game against the Chicago ... [+]
One month into the 2024 season Luis Severino is a feel good story in the realm of the New York baseball scene, doing it with a beard, which means he is a former Yankee.
While the Mets are hovering around .500, a mark many projected to be in the vicinity of even after losing their first five for the first time since 2005, Severino is thriving through his first 35 innings in a six-start sample size.
In those innings, his ERA is 2.31 and if you discount the initial start on March 30 against Milwaukee, that mark is 1.80. And he also is less hittable of late, allowing 15 hits in his last 30 innings after giving up 11 in his season debut.
Severino’s performances include five innings of one-hit ball against Kansas City for his first win on April 12 but he really stood out Monday by taking a no-hit bid into the eighth inning even though the Mets were unable to beat the Cubs.
“Probably as good as I’ve seen, especially using his fastball, in-out, up-down, he was electric,” Mets’ first-year manager Carlos Mendoza told reporters. “It was one of those outings that you’re saying like, OK, this is the Sevy that I know.”
It was the seventh time Severino pitched at least eight innings. The previous six times occurred in the 2017 and 2018 seasons when Severino was at his best for the Yankees winning 35 games and getting some consideration for the AL Cy Young in 2018 when he helped the Yankees win 100 games in manager Aaron Boone’s first season.
After the magic of 19 wins, Severino signed a four-year contract in spring training 2019 and it became a five-year pact when the Yankees picked up his option following a 2022 showing when he showed some glimpses by going 7-3 but also missing two months with a lat injury that the Yankees slow-played because of their big lead in the AL East at the time.
Then came last season when he pitched 89 1/3 innings and had a 6.65 ERA in 19 games. The disastrous season ended when an emotional Severino described the pain of an oblique injury while pitching at Yankee Stadium against Milwaukee.
Even before then it was apparent the Yankees were not going to retain him and the Mets opted for a one-year, $13 million prove it deal. After allowing opponents to bat .301 off him and compile a .921 OPS, Severino’s numbers in his first month with the Mets are down to .202 and .554 respectively. Those numbers are even better than 2018 when hitters were batting .238 and had a .666 OPS against him and more in line with a .202 opponents average and .603 OPS in his 14-win 2017 season.
It’s a far cry from late-July in Baltimore when the Yankees were hoping to get in the race with the return of Aaron Judge and Severino quietly said he felt like the “worst pitcher in baseball.”
“He’s kind of finding his groove,” Mets outfielder Brandon Nimmo told reporters. “I think it just shows he’s capable of what everybody thought he was. You can see that confidence on him. Just in the way he’s going about his business out there.”
And from where Severino was last summer and into the final month of his interesting tenure with the Yankees, it’s a good feeling for followers of the New York baseball season.
“That’s the thing about New York: If you’re doing good, you’re going to get something like that. If you’re doing bad, you’re going to get a lot of boos,” Severino said. “So I know they’re straight to you and I like that kind of thing about the fans. So every time I go out there and I do my job, it’s going to be like that.”
Now for the next five months, the Mets and fans of the New York baseball scene hope to keep enjoying similar showings from someone who was so dynamic at times in the Bronx while also helping his new team get involved in a crowded postseason race.
