Adam Rubin, ESPN Staff Writer 10y

deGrom may hit innings cap vs. Braves

ATLANTA -- Is Jacob deGrom making his final start of the season on Sunday against the Atlanta Braves?

Neither Terry Collins nor Sandy Alderson said as much, but reading between the lines, it certainly seems very possible.

Collins said Bartolo Colon will definitely make two more starts -- Tuesday at D.C. and in Sunday’s season finale -- because it is the veteran right-hander’s goal to reach 200 innings. Colon is currently 9 2/3 innings shy of that milestone.

So if Rafael Montero is to get a start during the final series, it would appear likely to come in place of deGrom. Collins did acknowledge that.

Alderson told ESPNNewYork.com that Montero “possibly” will start during the final series, but declined to go a step further and acknowledge this may be deGrom’s final start.

DeGrom is at 172 2/3 innings between the majors and Triple-A this season. That’s already a jump of 25 innings. Add in Sunday’s workload and that should put deGrom at more than 30 innings over last year’s total -- generally the cutoff point.

In essence, ensuring health would take precedence over a final statement in the NL Rookie of the Year race.

“After today we can always reassess it to where we think that enough is enough, depending on how he does today,” Collins said. “The whole thing has been to make sure when next Sunday comes that these five starters that are here are all healthy, because if you go into spring training and you can add that other piece that’s coming [Matt Harvey], that’s pretty impressive. But we want to make sure we don’t have to spend half the winter trying to rehab one of these guys. After today, we’ll just make a decision of whether or not he’s had enough or whether he can go one more.”

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