RA Dickey is King in Queens!

After a masterful outing last night at Citi Field, it seems as if RA Dickey might be THE MAN at the moment on the mounds of Queens. In last nights victory, a 5-0 win for the Mets, Dickey threw his 2nd straight one hitter, the other one being a 9-1 win over the Tampa Bay Rays. the one run he gave up against Tampa was an unearned run. He has thrown three straight complete game shutouts. RA's only loss this season was to the Atlanta Braves on April 18th, as he now sits at 11-1 on the season.

Dickey set a new Mets franchise record of 32 2⁄3 consecutive scoreless innings, besting Jerry Koosman's 31 2/3 in 1973. The win was Dickey's eighth consecutive victory, and improved his record to 10-1 over only 13 starts, with a 2.20 ERA. Dickey was the first pitcher in the major leagues to reach 10 wins during 2012. In his last five games, Dickey had struck out 50, given up three walks, and allowed only one earned run.

He became the first pitcher since 1988 to throw two consecutive one-hitters (Dave Stieb of the Toronto Blue Jays), and the first in the NL to do so since 1944 (Jim Tobin of the Boston Braves). He won for the sixth consecutive start and ninth straight decision overall, and set yet another new career high with 13 strikeouts. Terry Collins, remarked, "I've never seen anything like this. Never. I've seen some dominant pitching, but nothing like what he's going through right now." Hall of Fame Pitcher and fellow knuckleballer Phil Niekro commented on Dickey, "I had a few streaks, but nothing like he’s going through. I don’t know if any other knuckleballer has ever been on a hot streak like he has been. He is just dynamite right now."

RA is 11-1 on the season in 14 starts with 103 strikeouts on the year and an ERA of 2.00. He has thrown three complete games and two shutouts, while opponents are currently hitting .194 against him, which is showing total dominance by Dickey to this point in the season. What seems to be making Dickey so good this year is that batters are REALLY having a hard time trying to hit that knuckle ball, which is his go to pitch. A clip was shown on the MLB network that took a closer look at his knuckle ball and showed something surprising in the fact that the ball when thrown by Dickey only spins ONCE. Yes it only spins and rotates ONCE when the knuckle ball is thrown. That to me is showing how incredible his control has been during this run of his.

Now there are two big questions that Dickey has presented over the past few days, one is whether or not he should possibly be the starter for the NL during the all star game, and two can he possibly win the NL Cy Young award for best pitcher. In regards to the All Star game I would say Yes RA should be the starter. Right now Dickey is tied with Brandon Beachy of the Braves for the best ERA in baseball, and he leads beaseball in wins withw 11 just one ahead of Lance Lynn of the Cardnials. Dickey is tied with Justin Verlander of the Tigers for the league lead in strikelouts with 103, just one ahead of CC Sabathia of the Yankees who has 102. Granted there is still a month to go before the All Star game , which this year is in Kansas City. So anything can happen between now and then.

As for the NL Cy Young it is WAY too early to tell if Dickey can win the Cy this year. Only two other Mets have won the Cy Young, Tom Sever (who won three in 1969, 1973, and 1975) and Doc Gooden who won the award in 1985. To date no knuckleball pitcher has won a Cy Young award, although Phil Nikero may have been teh best candidate. The last two winners of the NL Cy Young, Clayton Kershaw of the Dodgers and Roy Halladay of the Phillies each won 21 games. Since the turn of the century, 5 guys who have won the NL Cy Young have won 20 or more games, so at the pace it seems Dickey is going, if he hits the 20 win mark, he has a great shot at winning the Cy Young. Now with all due respect to the pitchers in the Bronx, mostly CC Sabathia, RA Dickey is the King of Queens!