This week, on Wednesday, Cleveland Guardians left-hander Parker Messick earned his fifth win of the season, against just one loss. That day, he secured a sweep for his team, pitching 6.2 innings of two runs, striking out seven.
Outings like that have become the norm for the talented southpaw, except that he is a rookie and we shouldn’t take him for granted. Yet he is so good that it’s easy to get used to him dominating every five days.
Messick has now started nine games this year and boasts a marvelous 2.35 ERA in 53.2 innings. That’s just shy of six frames per outing, which is amazing. He has been the best and most consistent starter in a rotation that boasts Gavin Williams, Tanner Bibee, and Joey Cantillo.
It’s been more than a century since the Guardians witnessed such a dominant start to a career from a pitcher. The Athletic’s Zack Meisel has all the details.
“Before Parker Messick, the last Cleveland pitcher to start a career in such dazzling fashion was a man dubbed Vean. Sylveanus Augustus Gregg was born in 1885. That’s the sort of rarified air we’re talking about with Messick. In his first 16 outings as a major-leaguer, Messick has logged a 2.35 ERA in 93 1/3 innings. No Cleveland hurler has matched or bettered those numbers since our loose-jointed buddy, Vean,” Meisel wrote.
If we add up Messick’s 2025 cameo to his 2026 numbers, we get a 2.51 ERA in 93.1 frames. That’s electric.
Gregg made his MLB debut in 1911 for Cleveland and posted a brilliant 1.80 ERA in 244.2 innings. He was incredibly effective, even for dead-ball era standards. He pitched two and a half more years with the team after that and then joined the Boston Red Sox in 1914. He also had stints with the Philadelphia Athletics and the Washington Senators, and finished his career with a 2.70 ERA.
It’s been so long since Gregg’s dominant 1911 season that the team was called the Cleveland Naps back then, and it had Shoeless Joe Jackson, Nap Lajoie, and Cy Young on its roster.
Messick is turning back the clock and giving Cleveland another rookie pitcher to be excited about. At this point, he is leaving little doubt that he is a frontline starter.
The Guardians have a young, talented, and controllable starter to headline their rotation for years to come.
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