Do the New York Mets really have the top three MLB starters?

Is There a Mets Challenger in the rest of the NL?

(At this point, figures are after play June 15.) The short version of the story of the leading starters in the rest of the NL is that there are some fine performers, but only one team with three starters that might challenge the New York Mets leading trio at the moment.

However, the somewhat surprising picture does not have any of the powerhouse West teams – the Giants, Dodgers, and Padres – at the head of that pack.

Yes, the Dodgers trio of Walker Buehler, Clayton Kershaw, and Trevor Bauer are all sporting WHIPS below 1.00, and Buehler is undefeated (6-0), but the aggregate numbers aren’t quite at the Mets level at the moment. Bauer might well pick up the pace for the second two-thirds of the season, but is anyone truly confident that Kershaw, who is now 33, will maintain his current pace – 8-5/3.39/0.97.

The Giants are led, of course, by Kevin Gausman, who is finally fulfilling a potential identified years ago. He is currently at 7-1, with an ERA of 1.43 and a sterling 0.78 WHIP. Behind him are Anthony DeSclafani and Alex Wood, who are performing well, but not at the level of Dodgers second and third starters, and not at the Mets pace.

Additionally, when you get down to it, which mid-June ace would you bet on to maintain an ERA below 1.45 and a WHIP below 0.80 – deGrom or Gausman? With no disrespect meant toward the Giants right-hander, this is a slightly comical question. However, it would be a wonderful turn of events to see Gausman outperform the Mets flamethrower for the rest of the season.

Down in San Diego, then, Yu Darvish and Joe Musgrove lead the Padres starters with ERAs below 2.58 and WHIPS below 0.95, but there’s something of a falloff behind them, and we are considering the top three starters.

So, the one NL team actually positioned to challenge the Mets for the top three starters title is small-market Milwaukee. The Brewers feature three hurlers whose names are becoming widely known all too slowly. Likely only one in ten fans, if asked to name the second-best group of three starters would come up with Brandon Woodruff, Freddy Peralta, and Corbin Burnes.

But they are that second-best group now – sporting an aggregate 14-7 record, three ERAs below 2.28, and three WHIPS below 0.89. They may end up being the best group, even if none of them ends up posting numbers better than those deGrom ends up with.

On the other hand, Woodruff’s ERA now is 1.52 (“he’s within a point of deGrom!”), and the three Brewers have only given up 15 home runs.