Ranking the Top Rookie Seasons in Mets History

This past year, Jacob deGrom became the fifth player in Mets history to win the National League Rookie of the Year Award. The other winners were Tom Seaver in 1967, Jon Matlack in 1972, Darryl Strawberry in 1983 and Dwight Gooden in 1984.

All four of those former Mets ended up having either very good or great careers. All four would play in at least one World Series with the Mets, and all but Matlack were part of championship teams in Mets history. Being that deGrom has now joined some elite company within the Mets' ROY winners, hopefully, he could end up having a very good career himself going forward.

So with five Mets ROY winners, it's only right to see a ranking of how good their rookie seasons were in comparison to each other. Let's see which Mets Rookie of the Year had the best season of them all!

5. SP Jacob deGrom (2014)

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Rookie Season Statistics: 9-6, 2.69 ERA, 144 K, 140.1 IP, 22 GS, 1.140 WHIP

For as well as Jacob deGrom's 2014 season was, he starts the rankings at No. 5.

DeGrom won just nine games in his rookie season, which is by far the lowest of any Mets Rookie of the Year Award winner. However, this was more of a result of a lack of run support and inconsistency from the bullpen than deGrom's own pitching.

DeGrom also only pitched 140.1 innings, which meant he made fewer starts and was not going to win as many games as most healthy pitchers would due to the innings limit. However, he racked up 144 strikeouts in those innings for good measure. 

4. RF Darryl Strawberry (1983)

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Rookie Season Statistics: .257/.336/.512, 26 HR, 74 RBI, 47 BB, 63 R, 19 SB

As the lone Mets hitter to win the Rookie of the Year Award, Darryl Strawberry slides into No. 4 with a very solid rookie campaign of his own.

Strawberry's .257 average was somewhat low, but the power and speed he showed at the age of 21 were very good. Those numbers ended up being a shell of the numbers Strawberry produced during his time with the Mets from 1983-1990, when he averaged 32 home runs, 92 RBI and 24 steals per season.

Strawberry's rookie season clearly has to be looked at differently because he was a hitter, but the fact of the matter is that the other Mets pitchers had better rookie seasons.

SP Tom Seaver (1967)

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Rookie Season Statistics: 16-13, 2.76 ERA, 170 K, 251.0 IP, 34 GS, 1.203 WHIP

Tom Seaver is arguably the greatest player in Mets history and the lone member of the Hall of Fame to be inducted with a Mets cap. And although he holds many Mets single-season and career records, he comes in third on the Rookie of the Year season ranks.

Seaver won 16 games in his rookie year with a very nice 2.76 ERA. He threw a lot of innings as well, but then again, back in the 1960s, many pitchers threw a lot of innings in their starts.

Seaver would soon evolve into one of the best pitchers of all time. He won over 300 games, racked up over 3,000 strikeouts in his career and won three NL Cy Young Awards in 1969, 1973 and 1975. He later got his Hall of Fame induction in 1992.

2. SP Jon Matlack (1972)

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Rookie Season Statistics: 15-10, 2.32 ERA, 169 K, 244.0 IP, 32 GS, 1.172 WHIP

Jon Matlack had a great rookie season of his own in 1972. He has the lowest ERA and WHIP of any Mets Rookie of the Year pitcher. At a time when Tom Seaver and Jerry Koosman were a great duo atop the Mets rotation, Matlack emerged in 1972 as a reliable No. 3 for the future.

Matlack would help the Mets reach the World Series the following season and ended up spending seven seasons with the Mets from 1971-1977 before spending the rest of his career with the Rangers.

But for as great as Matlack's rookie season was, there was one other rookie season that was even better.

1. SP Dwight Gooden (1984)

Susan Ragan/Associated Press

Rookie Season Statistics: 17-9, 2.60 ERA, 276 K, 218.0 IP, 31 GS, 1.073 WHIP

Some of Matlack's numbers in his rookie season were better than Dwight Gooden's rookie season in 1984. However, Gooden has to take the top spot because he put together one of the most impressive rookie seasons of all time at just 19 years old.

While many 19-year-olds were on their way to college and work, Gooden was on a major league mound dominating veteran hitters as if he was a seasoned veteran himself. He led all of baseball in 1984 with his 276 strikeouts and 1.073 WHIP. His 276 strikeouts in 218 innings comes out to over one strikeout per inning. That's how dominant Gooden was at such a young age!

But Gooden's rookie season success was just a sampling of the success he would have in his second season. Gooden won the 1985 NL Cy Young Award with a 24-4 record, a 1.53 ERA and 268 strikeouts in 276.2 innings.

He'd then help the Mets win the 1986 World Series and reach the National League Championship Series in 1988. Gooden ended up spending 11 seasons with the Mets and averaged 14 wins and 170 strikeouts during that span. He would later bounce around to the Yankees, Indians and Astros near the end of his career.

To put up the numbers he did as a 19-year-old rookie, Gooden has to take the number one spot in these rankings.

All statistics shown are courtesy of Baseball-Reference.com.