Dylan Cease Is Doing Something Even Roger Clemens Couldn't With Blue Jays
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Dylan Cease stopped Christian Encarnacion-Strand’s line drive, quickly reacted to pick up the ball behind the mound and made an effective throw to first. Before returning to the dugout, he tossed his glove into the air and caught it.
He knew that, with 94 pitches, his outing had ended with five innings, one run, nine strikeouts and five walks. His command was not at its best and, even so, he managed to hold the Orioles to two hits and no runs until the start of the fifth.
Cease lowered his ERA to 2.38 and recorded his 17th start out of 28 this season with at least five innings, four or fewer hits allowed and two or fewer runs. In 14 of those 17, he has allowed one or fewer runs, an outing worthy of an American League Cy Young Award candidate this year.
What came after the game is even more fascinating when we give the numbers led by Cease the meaning they deserve. His ninth strikeout of the afternoon came against Coby Mayo, who ended up swinging and missing at an 89 mph sweeping slider in the middle of the strike zone.
Cease now leads the league with 236 strikeouts in his 28 starts, which opened a very interesting conversation.
Is that the highest strikeout total by a Blue Jays pitcher through the first 28 starts of his career with the team? No, but Cease came within one strikeout of Roger Clemens, who struck out 237 batters in 1997.
No other pitcher in club history has reached 200 or more strikeouts over that span of his first 28 appearances. Brandon Morrow (194), Robbie Ray (192) and Kevin Gausman (186) are the next names on the list.
However, Clemens’ one-strikeout advantage came with a 52-inning advantage. In other words, if we choose the best strikeout pitcher per nine innings over that same span, Cease has the advantage: 12.8 to 9.8 in K/9.
Either way, we are talking about two batter-devouring pitchers, two pitchers whose arsenals were designed to dominate opponents by making them swing and miss.
Clemens had a streak of seven seasons with at least 200 strikeouts. He began the streak at age 23 in 1986, when he completed one of the most dominant seasons of his career. That year, Clemens was in his third season since debuting with the Red Sox.
He won the MVP Award, the Cy Young Award and led the league with 24 wins, a 2.48 ERA, a 169 ERA+, a 2.81 FIP, a 0.969 WHIP and 6.3 H/9. He did not lead the league in strikeouts because he was surpassed by Seattle Mariners left-hander Mark Langston, 245 strikeouts to 238.
Cease, meanwhile, has the active streak with seasons of at least 200 strikeouts after reaching that mark for the sixth time since 2021 this year. He should have about two starts remaining in the regular season, so we will see how his numbers finish through his first 30 starts with the Blue Jays.
Clemens vs Cease
Pitcher | ERA | W-L | CG | SHO | GS 10+ K | 10-BR | SO9 | BB9 | SOBB | QS |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
Roger Clemens | 1.73 | 20-4 | 8 | 2 | 16 | 20/28 | 9.8 | 2.3 | 7.4 | 22 |
Dylan Cease | 2.38 | 11-5 | 1 | 1 | 12 | 27/28 | 12.8 | 3.9 | 8.9 | 13 |
Let’s compare some interesting points from their first 28 starts with the Blue Jays.
There are several areas in which Clemens established a dominant line in his era, but Cease has also put up impressive numbers. Clemens recorded more starts with 10 or more strikeouts (16), led with a 20-4 record, an impressive 1.73 ERA, eight complete games, two shutouts and 22 quality starts.
The differences are undeniable, but comparing ERAs is unavoidable, since Clemens did not pitch with the pitch limits that Cease faces. That does not guarantee that today’s starters would be more dominant if they were allowed to throw more pitches, but it marks a difference we cannot dismiss.
Cease, for example, has only 10 starts with 105 or more pitches. Of his remaining 18 starts, he never reached 100 pitches in 12 of them.
For that reason, I chose some available statistics such as K/9, BB/9 and SO/BB rates, and “10-BR,” which is the number of starts with at least 18 batters faced and fewer than 10 baserunners allowed via hits, walks or hit by pitch. That is a statistic that, as the pitcher faces more batters, can also become better or worse.
But definitely, smaller samples of baserunners carry more weight when pitchers face fewer batters. Cease’s case is very interesting, since in 27 of his 28 starts, he has allowed fewer than 10 baserunners in a game.
The last time Cease allowed more than 10 baserunners was 11 on April 27 against the Red Sox, when he allowed seven hits, issued three walks and hit a batter over 5 2/3 innings.
Clemens, on the other hand, could not be equally dominant and faced more situations generated by his own pitches. Even so, both were very consistent.
Clemens made his dominance count over the 52 innings he had on Cease, who so far has proven to be the best strikeout pitcher of all the pitchers to wear a Toronto uniform in history through their first 28 starts.
All statistics were verified using Statcast from Baseball Savant.
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Yirsandy is a baseball writer specializing in MLB coverage with experience across multiple teams and storylines. He currently writes for Diamond Centric, where he covers the New York Mets, San Diego Padres, Chicago Cubs, Milwaukee Brewers, and Kansas City Royals. My work focuses on game coverage, player analysis, and storytelling that connects performance with context. My Substack has also been an important part of my writing development, where I’ve built much of my baseball coverage and storytelling voice over time. I’m passionate about combining reporting, research, and thoughtful analysis to produce engaging baseball content for readers.
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