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Regardless of what the Mets' offense is doing lately, R.A. Dickey has kept up his outstanding season. For the past couple of months, we've checked in to compare Dickey's 2012 to two of the greatest pitching seasons in Mets history: Tom Seaver's 1973 and Dwight Gooden's 1985. Both seasons were worthy of the National League Cy Young Award.
Let's have a look at where each pitcher stands through twenty-six starts:
| IP | ERA | K | BB | |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| Seaver '73 | 212.2 | 1.78 | 182 | 45 |
| Gooden '85 | 202.2 | 1.82 | 192 | 51 |
| Dickey '12 | 182.1 | 2.76 | 183 | 41 |
At this stage of the 1985 season, Gooden struggled a bit, as he allowed 8 earned runs in 14.0 innings over starts number 25 and 26 despite excellent peripherals of 13 strikeouts and just 1 walk. Through the remainder of the season, his ERA would never again be as high as it was at this point.
Starts 25 and 26 for Seaver in 1973, however, were just about as good as it gets. He threw a pair of complete games, allowing one run in start 25 and pitching a shutout in start 26, with 14 strikeouts and 3 walks.
And Dickey, of course, pitched a pair of 7.0-inning, one-run games in his past two starts. His strikeout-to-walk ratio of 4.46 is still the best of the bunch. It will be damn near impossible for Dickey to catch up to either Gooden or Seaver in ERA, but there's no shame coming in third to this pair of seasons.